Desperate Romantics - BBC Series
I just watched the first episode Desperate Romantics, a six episode BBC series about the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood based the book Desperate Romantics: The Private Lives Of The Pre-Raphaelites by Franny Moyal. These were English artists who in the middle of the 19th century challenged the London establishment with their art and with their lives. Watching Desperate Romantics is a little like watching Sex in the City but with guys, in London, 150 years ago… and I mean that in a good way. It inspired me to dust off my art history books and re-examine the Pre-Raphaelites.
The paintings featured in each episode are highlighted with commentary on the BBC Desperate Romantics website.
Artist rebels, the Pre-Raphaelites were named as an act of rebellion against the English Academy’s entrenched adherence to the authority of the high renaissance painter Raphael. The brotherhood formed around the painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Son of an exiled Italian revolutionary, it was Rosetti who influenced the group to form a secret brotherhood. They believed in bringing a new moral and literary rigor to painting, observing nature directly and disregarding conventional rules.
Beata Beatrix by Dante Gabriel Rossetti - Oil on Canvas, 1864-70
Artist rebels, the Pre-Raphaelites were named as an act of rebellion against the English Academy’s entrenched adherence to the authority of the high renaissance painter Raphael. The brotherhood formed around the painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Son of an exiled Italian revolutionary, it was Rosetti who influenced the group to form a secret brotherhood. They believed in bringing a new moral and literary rigor to painting, observing nature directly and disregarding conventional rules.
Ophelia by John Evertt Millais - Oil on Canvas, 1851-1852
...studied these guys (and the ladies) in college...fascinating bunch and their literary counterparts...
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