Elaine the Lily Maid of Astolat Guarded the Sacred Shield of Lancelot

“Elaine the fair, Elaine the loveable,
Elaine, the lily maid of Astolat,
High in her chamber up a tower to the east
Guarded the sacred shield of Lancelot;
Which first she placed where the morning’s earliest ray
Might strike it, and awake her with the gleam;
Then fearing rust or soilure fashioned for it
A case of silk… (…)
Nor rested thus content, but day by day,
Leaving her household and good father, climbed
That eastern tower, and entering barred her door,
Stript off the case, and read the naked shield,
Now guessed a hidden meaning in his arms,
Now made a pretty history to herself
Of every dint a sword had beaten in it,
And every scratch a lance had made upon it…
(…) … so she lived in fantasy.”

(Lord Tennyson, Idyll of the Kings: Elaine and Lancelot, 1859)

Henry Peach Robinson, Elaine Watching the Shield of Lancelot, 1859

Lady of Shalott, also known as Elaine, the Lily Maid of Astolat, is by far my favourite and most relatable character from the Arthurian legends. In the poem Lord Tennyson refers to her sweetly also as Elaine the fair, Elaine the loveable. The Pre-Raphaelite artists seem to have had a particular penchant for portraying Elaine as well, inspired partly by her rather different depictions in Lord Tennyson’s poetry as well as by Sir Thomas Malory’s “Le Mort D’Arthur”. Still, not only Victorian painters but photographers such as Henry Peach Robinson were inspired to portray the loneliness of Elaine’s life in the tower and her exceeding yearning for a knight. Elaine “hath no loyal knight and true”, as Lord Tennyson wrote in another poem about her. The poet also writes that she “lived in fantasy”, and that she is “half-sick of shadows”; hers is a lonely, lovelorn life filled with yearning and pining, and a lot of free time which she uses, it seems, to gaze day and night at Sir Lancelot’s shield. She not only gazes at it and traces its decorations with her pale fingers, but she also tends to it as if it were, and indeed it is in Elaine’s eyes, the most precious object in the world. It is something that belongs to the man she loves oh so desperately. These verses from Delmira Augustini’s poem “From Far Away” made me think of poor Elaine:

“Ah! When you are far away my whole life cries
And to the murmor of your steps even in dreams I smile.
I know you will return, that another dawn will shine.”

The basis for Robinson’s photograph seems to have been the Lord Tennyson’s description of Elaine’s obsession with Sir Lancelot’s shield. The poet writes that Elaine had placed the “sacred shield” in her chamber up a tower to the east where it can be bathed by the first rays of sun, and how she made a silk case for the shield so it doesn’t get rusty, and how she would leave her household all the time to climb the tower and gaze at the shield for hours, tracing every dint and scratch on it completely entranced, imagining all the battles and tournaments that Sir Lancelot had been in, and shivering at the thought that he may almost have died in some of them.

In Sir Thomas Malory’s telling of the events Elaine’s father, the Lord of Astolat, had organised a tournament to which King Arthur and his knights came. Sir Lancelot, who had not originally planned to attend, was persuaded to come and, upon seeing him, Elaine becamse enamoured of him and she begged him to wear her token at the torunament. Sir Lancelot, knowing how jealous Guinevere would be, decided to wear Elaine’s token and compete in the tournament but only under disguise so he takes a different shield, that of Elaine’s brother, and leaves his own shield to Elaine to keep. Here is what Lord Tennyson writes about that moment:

“(…) ’True, my child.
Well, I will wear it: fetch it out to me:
What is it?’ and she told him ’A red sleeve
Broidered with pearls,’ and brought it: then he bound
Her token on his helmet, with a smile
Saying, ’I never yet have done so much
For any maiden living,’ and the blood
Sprang to her face and filled her with delight”.

And then Lancelot tells Elaine:
’Do me this grace, my child, to have my shield
In keeping till I come.’ ’A grace to me,’
She answered.’”

Sir Lancelot gets injured in the tournament and Elaine tends to him in her chambers. When he gets better, he thanks Elaine and she returns the shield to him. Now he is aware of her affections for him but he departs nevertheless and Elain dies from a broken heart ten days later. Sir Lancelot later pays for a lavish funeral – as if that is a reparation enough for a broken heart. Hm!

Arhur Hughes – Fair Rosamund

“‘My Rosamonde, my only Rose,
That pleasest best mine eye,
The fairest flower in all the worlde
To feed my fantasye…”

Arhur Hughes, Fair Rosamund, 1854

Arthur Hughes’ painting “Fair Rosamund” may be vibrant and beautiful visually, but the story behind this artwork is sinster and cruel. A beautiful, fair, long-haired and rosy cheeked young woman in the garden, what can be a more innocent motif to paint? But things are not as flowery and fragrant as they seem…

According to the legend, Fair Rosamund was the mistress of Henry II of England and he had created a garden specially for her at his royal residence in Woodstock, Oxfordshire, which was accesible only by a maze so that no one else could find their way in. How lovely to think of Fair Rosamund, safe there in her garden, a flower amongst the flowers. Unfortunately, one day, in 1176, Henry’s wife Eleanor of Aquitaine found her way into the garden, found Fair Rosamund there and poisoned her. Poisoning as a method of murder has been historically linked to women, perhaps because it’s less direct and more passive-agressive, an art that women have mastered. In the Victorian era poisoning was also a common choice of murder so perhaps the motif resonated with the Victorian artists. The tale of Fair Rosamund was a popular motif for the nineteenth century artists, in particular the Pre-Raphaelites and those associated with the movement.

Now, this is really one of those paintings where every single detail tells a story and where you eye can just wander all over the canvas and take in all the details, delight in the colours, and let it all come alive. Despite the beautiful, lush and fragrant garden setting, Hughes chose to depict a dramatic moment when the Queen has entered the garden. Drama is lurking from the background. In the foreground there is Fair Rosamund with her beautiful, long wavy coppery hair and her sweet round face. I must say, I do love the way Arthur Hughes paints female faces, they are just so lovely. Her medieval-style dress, in green and purple, seems to echo the colour of the irises that are growing beneath her feet. She looks like a nymph almost, with her coopery locks all loose and untied, a flower-child, a hippie gal. Her hand gesture, her slightly parted lips and a look of worry in her eyes suggest that something is not quite right. Something has disturbed her and it is evident. In the background we see the Queen Eleanor who has just entered the garden. The path that leads from the garden gates where the Queen is standing to the Fair Rosamund is lined with blue foxgloves; a flower known for its poisonous properties. The painting may be silent, but the flowers in it speak volumes. The irises before Rosamund are not perhaps solely here for the aesthetic, as beautiful as they are. The Greek goddess Iris, amongst other things, had also the task of chaperoning the souls of the dead females to the Elysian fields. In a way, this hints to Fair Rosamund’s fate; from her flower garden she will depart into the Elysian fields.

Arthur Hughes was not a member of the Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood, but he was closely associated with the movement, he exhibited his paintings alongside the Pre-Raphaelites and he focused on portraying medieval themes. As I said, I really love the vibrant colour and the attention to details in this painting. I just cannot get enough of this painting. Just look the play of the sunlight and shadows on the garden path and the fallen leaves, how alive it seems. The dense ivy, the white roses, all the different shades of green. It is just stunning!

10:15 On a Saturday Night Waiting For the Telephone to Ring, Wondering Where He’s Been…

The song “10:15 Saturday Night” was the first song on the band’s debut album “The Three Imaginary Boys”, released on 11th May 1979. Just like many other songs by The Cure, it is about loneliness and despair, on a Saturday night which is very convenient because Saturday is usually the fun day of the week, the day for parties and pleasure, but it can also be the loneliest day, and night, of the week. Even if the party-abstinence and the isolation are self-imposed, as they were with Morrissey for example, one does still feel this slight ache… Robert Smith actually wrote the song when he was sixteen years old while sitting in his kitchen and feeling lonely one Saturday night. The song does have a teenage vibe to it and I love its rawness and simplicity. The water dripping in the sink, as described in the lyrics, is a monotonous reminder of the passing of time and it adds to the overall mood of doom and gloom; he is alone at home on a Saturday night, waiting for the telephone to ring, waiting for the girl to call, wondering where she’s been, and the dripping of the water in the sink is the only sound breaking the moody silence. Now, Millais’ watercolour “Dreams at Dawn”, painted in 1968, has a dawn setting, but who’s to say it’s not 10:15 and the girl is on her balcony, wondering where her beloved is? Is he thinking of her? Is he writing to her? The quietness of the lonely evening is only disturbed by her occasional sigh or a scream of a distant bird. The girl’s pose, her head leaned on her hand, says it all. Her eyes may be turned upwards at the big shining moon, but we know her thoughts are elsewhere… The stars may be shining beautifully but the magic is lost for her because she can’t stop wondering; where he’s been???

John Everett Millais, A Dream at Dawn, 1868

10.15
10.15
Saturday night
Saturday night
And the tap drips
And the tap drips
Under the strip light
Under the strip light
And I’m sitting
And I’m sitting
In the kitchen sink
In the kitchen sink
And the tap drips
And the tap drips
Drip drip drip drip drip drip drip drip
Drip drip drip drip drip drip drip drip
Waiting
Waiting
For the telephone to ring
For the telephone to ring
And I’m wondering
And I’m wondering
Where she’s been
Where she’s been
And I’m crying
And I’m crying
For yesterday
For yesterday
And the tap drips
And the tap drips
Drip drip drip drip drip drip drip drip
Drip drip drip drip drip drip drip drip
It’s always the same
It’s always the same

Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale: With goodly greenish locks, all loose untied (A Nymph)

“There, in a meadow, by the river’s side,
A flock of nymphs I chanced to espy,
All lovely daughters of the flood thereby,
With goodly greenish locks, all loose untied…”

Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale, ‘With goodly greenish locks, all loose untied’, 1915, pencil and watercolour

April is a green month. Whereas in March the blossoming trees coloured the horizon, in April nature is all clad in green, at last. On cloudy days especially the verdant landscape is ever so vibrant. I think my enthusiasm for spring is quite obvious from my recent posts, and indeed I take delight every day in the awakening of nature and the lushness and sensuality that accompany it. I seek the same sensations in the world of art and this watercolour by Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale known under the titled “With goodly greenish locks, all loose untied” perfectly encapsulated the April vibes that I am feeling at the moment. This is April in a painting, for me. A beautiful month, a beautiful painting. I am thoroughly enjoying all the Pre-Raphaelitesque details in each and every leaf, the nymph’s green-blueish hair, the reflections in the water… it is beyond praise. Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale was not a Pre-Raphaelite artist in the strict sense of the word, but her style of painting, vibrant and detailed, and her choice of motifs is very much Pre-Raphaelite. The natural setting in this watercolour, painted with such admirable attention to all the details, to every flower, every leaf, every branch, every blade of grass, is very reminiscent of John Everett Millais’ painting “Ophelia”. We might assume the same natural setting was used for the portraits of Ophelia and this lovely nymph.

The watercolour shows a naked nymph by the river, holding flowers in both of her hands. She seems surprised, caught off guard and gazing at something, or someone, that we cannot see. Despite being portrayed as naked, which is usual for a nymph, she doesn’t seem to be flaunting her nakedness in a sensual or inviting manner, as perhaps Waterhouse’s nymphs are doing, but rather she seems innocent to the point of unawareness, untroubled by society’s norms and demands, she is a free nature’s child and her heart is pure. Her long dark hair, tinged with shades of blue and green, and adorned with flowers, is elegantly covering her body and the blades of grass bellow are doing the same thing.

This watercolour is found in the “The Book of Old English Songs and Ballads” (printed in Edinburgh in 1915) and is an illustration for Edmund Spenser’s poem “Prothalamion” written in 1596 on the ocassion of a double wedding of Ladie Elizabeth and Ladie Katherine Somerset. The poem meditates on marriage, beauty of the brides and their wedding day, and dwells on the beauty of the natural world as opposed to the restrictive world of court and politics. In the poem, on a calm day when the sweet breathing Zephyrus did softly play, the poet goes for a walk by the river Thames and sees nymphs, “the lovely daughters of the flood”, as he calls them, who are gathering flowers, lilies, daisies and primroses, and putting them in their little baskets.

Details

Here are the opening lines of the poem from where the title of the watercolour was taken:

“CALM was the day, and through the trembling air
Sweet breathing Zephyrus did softly play,
A gentle spirit, that lightly did delay
Hot Titan’s beams, which then did glister fair;
When I (…)
Walked forth to ease my pain
Along the shore of silver streaming Thames,
Whose rutty bank, the which his river hems,
Was painted all with variable flowers,
And all the meads adorned with dainty gems,
Fit to deck maidens’ bowers,
And crown their paramours,
Against the bridal day, which is not long:
Sweet Thames, run softly, till I end my song.

There, in a meadow, by the river’s side,
A flock of nymphs I chanced to espy,
All lovely daughters of the flood thereby,
With goodly greenish locks, all loose untied,
As each had been a bride;
And each one had a little wicker basket,
Made of fine twigs, entrailed curiously,
In which they gathered flowers to fill their flasket,
And with fine fingers cropt full featously
The tender stalks on high.
Of every sort, which in that meadow grew,
They gathered some; the violet pallid blue,
The little daisy, that at evening closes,
The virgin lily, and the primrose true…“

Season of the Witch – Frederick Sandys: Morgan-le-Fay

Frederick Sandys (1829–1904), Morgan-le-Fay, 1863-64

Morgan le Fay is a beautiful and seductive enchantress, a witch we might even say, from Arthurian legends whose only purpose in life is to destroy King Arthur and his wonderful castle of Camelot.

I really liked the portrayal of Morgana in the series “Merlin” where she is played by the Irish actress Katie McGrath. Not only is she gorgeous with her pale skin, black hair and grey eyes, dressed in long, flowing purple, blue and green gown, but I also like the development of her character throughout the series. At first she is this slightly naive young woman and King Uther’s ward who is disturbed by the appaling treatment of druids and other people who practice magic, but over time, as she discovers her own magical powers and as she experiences betrayals from people she trusted, she develops a deep hatred for Camelot and everybody there, including King Arthur of course. Her thorny path from innocence to evil is symbolically represented in her departure from the civilised and beautiful environment of the castle of Camelot to the lonely wilderness of the Isle of Avalon. There Morgana can devote herself to things that she is most passionate about; destroying Camelot, taking over power from King Arthur and hurting him in every way possible. And that is something she is doing in this painting.

Frederic Sandys’ depiction of Morgana is perhaps the most famous one from the Victorian era and it certainly struck the imagination of the Victorians because he portrays Morgana as a dangerous femme fatale. In the painting Morgana is seen in her chamber overlooking the lake, as we can see the glistening blue lake through the window in the upper right corner. She is holding a lamp and passing it over the robe and chanting her spells over the robe that she had just woven for King Arthur on her loom. The enchanted robe is suppose to set King Arthur’s body on fire as soon as he puts it on, but that doesn’t happen, of course, because a messanger had tried the robe before him. Sandys’ depiction of Morgana truly sets a tone for her image as a dangerous and alluring femme fatale; her loose auburn hair is seen cascading down her back, the jewel like colours of her robe certainly don’t speak of modesty, and that animal skin really adds a wild touch. The face expression and the gesture of her hands are both very expressive. She seems very caught in the moment, completely consumed with hatred for King Arthur. The robe she is wearing was actually a kimono and the model for Morgana was Sandys’ lover Keomi Gray. Gazing at the Lady Morgana here made me think of another witch I love; Elaine, also known as the Love Witch from the film “The Love Witch” (2016). Elaine is also an example of a wild and dangerous woman, but she is not consumed with hatred and jealousy but rather with a desire for love. Here are some pictures from the film bellow, along with a painting by another Pre-Rapahaelite inspired painter John William Waterhouse because it’s similar in style and pose.

John William Waterhouse, The Crystal Ball, 1902

Samantha Robinson as Elaine aka “The Love Witch” in the film “The Love Witch” (2016)

Dante Gabriel Rossetti – Venus Verticordia

“‘Alas! the apple for his lips,—the dart

That follows its brief sweetness to his heart,—”

(Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Venus Verticordia)

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Venus Verticordia, 1864-68

Painting “Venus Verticordia” is a gorgeous example of Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s style of portraits from the 1860s. The original model for the goddess of love was an exceptionally beautiful cook that Rossetti had met in the street. We don’t know what she looked like; perhaps she fit Rossetti’s ideal of a woman perfectly, or perhaps with his imagination and with his brush he transformed her into his feminine ideal. Regardless,in 1867 he had altered the face on the portrait to fit the features of his favourite model Alexa Wilding who sat for many of his paintings. The goddess of Love was portrayed in so many ways and so many times throughout history, but here she takes on the typical features of Rossetti’s feminine ideal; her hair is long, lush and auburn, her eyelids heavy and langorous, her lips thick and pouty, her neck strong. This is a far cry from the weak, frail and melancholy beauty exemplified by his lover and muse Elizabeth Siddal whose face and figure domineered his art of the previous decade.

“Venus Verticordia” means “Venus, changer of the heart” and was said to change the hearts of men from lust to love, but the mood and symbolism in Rossetti’s portrait tell a different story. The eroticism isn’t subtle and subdued here, but rather the goddess’ breasts are lavishly exposed. The space around her is filled with lush, vibrant flowers, roses and honesuckles, whose symbolic connotations of passion and female sexuality would have been known to the Victorian audience. She is holding a golden arrow in her hand, a motif we usually see with her son Cupid, the god of desire erotic love. A contrasting motif to all this is a golden halo and butterflies around her head, both are symbolically connected with spiritual, not earthly or sensual matters. The halo typically graces the heads of saints and butterflies are sometimes seen as symbolic of the soul, so perhaps a soulful love and not just a carnal one.

The painting left no one speechless when it was exhibited at the Royal Academy. Art critic and writer John Ruskin found the painting tasteless to put it lightly while others such as the poet Algernon Charles Swinburne wrote: “The great picture of Venus Verticordia has now been in great measure recast; the head is of a diviner type of beauty; golden butterflies hover about the halo of her hair; alight upon the apple or the arrow in her hands; her face has the sweet supremacy of a beauty imperial and immortal; her glorious bosom seems to exult and expand as the roses on each side of it. The painting of leaf and fruit and flower in this picture is beyond my praise or any man’s; but of one thing I will here take note; the flash of green brilliance from the upper leaves of the trellis against the sombre green of the trees behind. Once more it must appear that the painter alone can translate into words as perfect in music and colour the sense and spirit of his work.”

Stills from the film “Love Witch” (2016)

When I look into the eyes of this redhead Venus conjured in the imagination of the Victorian artist, poet and an aesthete, the image of Elaine Parks from the film “Love Witch” (2016) comes to mind; both have that look of indifference and power in their eyes, a certain awareness of their beauty and dominance, and they are confident about their inevitable success in love matters. It is a gaze that brings doom to a man who gazes back at it.

Ford Madox Brown – Capturing the Atmosphere: Walton-on-the-Naze and The Hayfield

Ford Madox Brown, Walton-on-the-Naze (1860)

The final days of August are always tinged in melancholy. Summer is not yet gone, and autumn has not yet arrived. The rich and vibrant facade of summer is slightly cracking and a yearning for what once was fills the cracks, and even a sunny, warm day or the beauty of a blooming rose are haunted by a feeling of nostalgia for the passing summer. The first rain, or a gust of wind, the first sight of yellow leaves on a chestnut tree all seem ominous of what is to come. This mood inhabits some of the Pre-Raphaelite paintings and two of such examples are landscape scenes by Ford Madox Brown. His paintings “The Hayfield” and “Walton-on-the-Naze” both possess that rich yet wistful ambience. Most of the painting “The Hayfield” was painted slowly and patiently during a period of time from late July to early September and, following the Pre-Raphaelite philosophy of painting directly from nature, Brown would walk miles and miles from his house two times a week to a spot where the scenery was the most delightful. Waiting for the perfect light, he would start painting at 5 am. The twilight scene shows the end of a working day; the moon had just risen but there is still enough daylight to reveal the scene to our eyes. The farmers are slowly getting ready to go home, there are children sittin in the haycart and one man is gazing up at the moon. You can feel the chill in the air, the slightly damp, cold grass, children’s cheerful chatter… The colours of the painting proved to be controversial, just as was the case with John Constable’s landscape some years before, but Brown stated in the catalogue for the painting that: “the stacking of the second crop of hay had been much delayed by rain, which heightened the green of the remaining grass, together with the brown of the hay. The consequence was an effect of unusual beauty of colour, making the hay by contrast with the green grass, positively red or pink, under the glow of twilight”. This shows us that the Victorian audience had a perception of reality and nature different to what it really was and they didn’t want to see the reality in art, but rather their dreamy vision of the world around them.

The painting “Walton-on-the-Naze”, painted during Brown’s visit to this small coastal town in Essex in August 1859, again features the motif of a rising moon and the gorgeous effect of light. This might be his most beautiful landscape because the ephemeral light and the effect of depth are just mesmerising. The air seems soft, rosy and palpable and the rainbow in the sky adds a whole new dreamy dimension to the scene. I had had the luck of seeing the rainbow but a few weeks ago and its beauty still charms my memory. The male figure is the portrait of Brown himself and the female figure is Brown’s wife Emma. The little girl is their daughter Catherine. The beautiful visual rhythm of the stacks of wheat in the foreground may reminds us of the harvest time and the work that is to be done, but this painting isn’t the harvesting type like the previous one, but a touristy type because Brown and his family were on holiday in that coastal town when he painted it and this reflects the Victorian discovery of coastal towns and the sea as places for leisure, rest and fun. Londoners could have easily reached the coast via a steamer train and one is seen in the background of this painting. Even Elizabeth Siddal and Rossetti stayed on the sea for her health around the same time. The layers of depth in this painting are superb, I mean just look at the ship disappearing on the horizon, a pink sky behind it, how utterly dreamy.

Ford Madox Brown, The Hayfield, 1855-56

Dante Gabriel Rossetti – Elizabeth Siddal Having Her Hair Combed

Earlier this year, on the 12th May, I wrote a post to celebrate the birthday of the great artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti and I think it would only be fair to celebrate Elizabeth Siddal’s birthday as well. She was born on this day in 1829 in London.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Elizabeth Siddal Having Her Hair Combed, c. 1855, brown ink on paper, 153 x 115 mm

Pre-Raphaelite poet and painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti is mostly remembered for his richly coloured, dense and detailed close-up portraits of languid and beautiful women that bring back the spirit of the High Renaissance portraits by painters such as Titian and Veronese, but his pencil and ink drawings show a completely different side to the artist.

“Elizabeth Siddal Having Her Hair Combed” is an ink drawing made sometime in 1855, as stated on the back of the drawing by Rossetti’s brother William Michael Rossetti. The drawing shows Rossetti’s lover and muse Elizabeth Siddal who is having her hair combed by a maid while she is reading a book, maybe a book of Keats’ poetry. The drawing doesn’t do justice to Elizabeth’s long, lush, coppery red hair, but it gives us a glimpse into the intimate world of two bohemian lovers. Rossetti met Elizabeth in 1850 and she quickly became his favourite thing to paint. At first she posed for other artists in the Pre-Raphaelite circle, but very soon Rossetti made sure she posed for him only. Rossetti’s brother commented once that the walls of Rossetti’s studio were filled with drawings of Elizabeth; Elizabeth combing her hair, Elizabeth having her hair combed, Elizabeth reading or just sitting in a chair and daydreaming. Such was the extent of Rossetti’s passion and obsession for his melancholy girl. This might seem a bit extreme, even creepy, but in Rossetti’s case it shows just how much Elizabeth fueled his art and how, at last, in Elizabeth’s face and person, he found a perfect muse. The small drawing executed in brown ink is a glimpse into their everyday life, almost like a photograph, it captures the moment in a quick and sketchy manner. It must be noted how stylised Elizabeth’s face is and how skillfully executed the drawing is. The ink drawing above and the pencil sketch bellow unite two of Rossetti’s lifelong obsessions; Elizabeth Siddal and lush, long woman’s hair.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Elizabeth Siddal Plaiting her Hair, c. 1850s, graphite on paper, 117 x 127 mm

Dreamy Pictures of Ingrid Boulting, Vogue UK, July 1970

“…the rose is full blown,
And the riches of Flora are lavishly strown;
The air is all softness, and chrystal the streams,
And the west is resplendently cloathed in beams.

We will hasten, my fair, to the opening glades,
The quaintly carv’d seats, and the freshening shades;
Where the fairies are chaunting their evening hymns,
And in the last sun-beam the sylph lightly swims.

And when thou art weary, I’ll find thee a bed,
Of mosses, and flowers, to pillow thy head…”

(John Keats, To Emma, 1815)Model Ingrid Boulting photographed at Lacock Abbey, “Summer at Source”, by Norman Parkinson for Vogue UK, July 1970

This photograph taken by Norman Parkinson for the July edition of Vogue UK in 1970 is just one picture from a series of pictures taken at the Lacock Abbey. The lovely girl in the picture that looks like Botticelli’s angel is a model Ingrid Boulting. She might not be as well-remembered today as Twiggy is, but in the 1960s and 1970s Ingrid, with her delicate figure and a pale face doll-like face with big blue eyes, was posing for photographers such as David Bailey and Richard Avedon, and she modelled for the Biba fashion boutique. Ingrid was not a Mod girl with pixie haircut and sharp eyeliner, but rather her looks embodied the soft, rose-tinted aesthetic of the early 1970s. Delicate, ethereal, with silky hair and a quiet, mysterious aura around her, Ingrid is the embodiment of a Pre-Raphaelite muse. That is why I think she was just perfect for this series of pictures taken at the Lacock Abbey, a mansion in Wiltshire, England, built in the Gothic style of the thirteenth century. Pre-Raphaelites, after all, looked back at the Medieval times as times of truth and idealism.

What I like about this photograph, apart from Ingrid’s gorgeous face, is the continual interplay of contrasting elements. The picture appears both static, controlled and carefully arranged, but at the same time there is an undeniable dreamy, carefree quality to it. The girl’s hands are arranged in a pose we might see in a medieval painting, and her hair is dancing freely in the wind. In the background the old, wise, worn-out, poetry-filled stone of the abbey meets the fragile and transient summer flowers. This scene looks to me like a place where “the riches of Flora are lavishly strown” and “the air is all softness”, as Keats wrote in his poem “To Emma”. Ingrid’s attire makes me imagine her as a lady who once may have lived in that abbey, holding flowers in her hands and awaiting the return of her knight from a battle. The scene oozes a mood that is archaic and sweet, soft, delicate, laden with poetry and dreams. It’s almost a painful sweetness that I feel whilst gazing at this picture because I wish that could be the life itself; a long summer afternoon filled with flowers and poetry.

The square shape and the grey tones of the picture may at first seem constricting it because our eyes are used to wandering freely over the picture, in a horizontal or vertical direction, as is the usual shape of the pictures. The black and white picture doesn’t reveal to us the delicate summer shades of the scene, but in this case the black and white is perfect because it allows our imagination to fill the space with colours, and not just colours, but the scents and sounds too. Even though I usually love vibrant colours, in this case I don’t want to see the colours, I want to feel them. Just as it is in a dream; you might not see everything clearly, or hear it, but you know it is there, you feel it in a way which is superior to only seeing it. As I already said, this is one of a few pictures taken for the 1970 July Vogue UK so I will put some others bellow. They are also very beautiful but this one is my favourite.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti – Paolo and Francesca da Rimini

“Love led us straight to sudden death together.”

(Dante, Inferno, Canto V)

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Paolo and Francesca da Rimini, 1855, watercolour

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, an English poet, painter, illustrator, translator and most importantly the founder of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, was born on this day in 1828 in London so let us use the opportunity and remember the fascinating and charismatic artist on his birthday. Rossetti had artistic aspirations from an early age and his siblings shared those aspirations as well. His maternal uncle was John William Polidori; the friend of Lord Byron and the author of the short story “The Vampyre” (1819). He died seven years before Rossetti was born, but it shows what kind of family ancestry Rossetti had and why it was perfectly natural for him to aspire to become a poet and an artist. Half-Italian and half-mad, Rossetti idealised and glorified the Italian past, especially the Medieval era and the writings of Dante Alighieri; a hero whom he worshipped. In 1848 he founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood along with William Holman Hunt whose painting “The Eve of St. Agnes” Rossetti had seen on an exhibition and loved, and the young prodigy John Everett Millais. Their aim was to paint again like the old masters did; with honesty and convinction, using vibrant colours and abundance of details, and most of all; to paint from the heart.

In 1850, two very important things happened in Rossetti’s life; he met Elizabeth Siddal; a moody and melancholy redhaired damsel who was to become the main object of his adoration in decade to come, his pupil, his lover and muse; and, he focused on painting watercolours. In the 1850s Rossetti’s head wasn’t all in the clouds of love, no half of it was in the rose-tinted clouds of the past, his main artistic inspirations being the Arthurian legends and Dante.

His watercolour “Paolo and Francesca da Rimini” from 1855 is a synthesis of these two inspirations; his love Lizzy Siddal and Dante. The watercolour is a tryptich (read from left to right) in intense, rich colours portraying the tale of doomed lovers Paolo Malatesta and Francesca da Rimini who was the wife of his brother. Paolo and Francesca were real-life historical figures, but Rossetti’s inspirations stems from Dante’s Inferno, specifically from the Canto V where Dante and Virgil, portraid in the central panel of the tryptich, enter the part of Hell where the souls of passionate and sinful lovers remain for eternity. The first tryptich shows Paolo and Francesca in a kiss. A secret, guilty, and forbidden kiss and yet Rossetti’s scene only shows a tender and passionate moment between lovers, their hands clasped together, Paolo pulling her closer. Francesca’s long red hair and face resemble the hair and face of Elizabeth Siddal, and the figure of Paolo was based on Rossetti himself. It is as if he knew that his love would be as doomed, though in a different way, just like that of Paolo and Francesca.

The interior is simple and allows the focus to be on the couple and their secret kiss. A plucked rose on the floor, an opened book with glistening illuminations is on Francesca’s lap shows the activity that bonded the pair and made the kiss inevitable, from Dante’s Inferno, Canto V:

Dante asks Francesca:

“But tell me, in that time of your sweet sighing

how, and by what signs, did love allow you

to recognize your dubious desires?”

And she responds:

And she to me: “There is no greater pain

than to remember, in our present grief,

past happiness (as well your teacher knows)!

But if your great desire is to learn

the very root of such a love as ours,

I shall tell you, but in words of flowing tears.

One day we read, to pass the time away,

of Lancelot, how he had fa llen in love;

we were alone, innocent of suspicion.

Time and again our eyes were brought together

by the book we read; our fa ces flushed and paled.

To the moment of one line alone we yielded:

it was when we read about those longed-for lips

now being kissed by such a famous lover,

that this one (who shall never leave my side)

then kissed my mouth, and trembled as he did.“

When I gaze at this left panel of the tryptich, a lyric from Bruce Springsteen’s song “The River” comes more and more to my mind, I wonder does the memory of the kiss come back to haunt Paolo and Francesca in hell:

“Pull her close just to feel each breath she’d take
Now those memories come back to haunt me
They haunt me like a curse
Is a dream a lie if it don’t come true
Or is it something worse
That sends me down to the river
Though I know the river is dry…”

“When finally I spoke, I sighed, “Alas,

what sweet thoughts, and oh, how much desiring

brought these two down into this agony.”

(Dante, Inferno, Canto V)

The central part of the tryptich, as I’ve said, shows Dante and Virgil. The third or the right wing of the tryptich shows the afterlife of the doomed lovers in Hell. Just like the sould of other unfortunate and lustful lovers, Paolo and Francesca are shown being carried by the wind of passion that swept them away in their living life on earth too, in each other’s arms for eternity. Are they being mercilessly carried by the wind, or have they overpowerd it and are riding it blissfully? All around them flames of hell dance like shooting stars. Quite romantic actually, I don’t see where the punishment part comes myself. Still, there is a message and the tale of doomed lovers in hell shows how a single moment and a single step is enough to commit a sin; the kiss was the act of weakness and passion. That single moment of weakness endangered forever their possibility of eternal glory.

Unlike other artists before him who have portrayed the story of Paolo and Francesca, Rossetti convinently avoids portraying the bloody and gruesome moment when the lovers are caught by Paolo’s brother Gianciotto who is also Francesca’s husband and murders them both. I really like that Rossetti painted a tryptich whose theme isn’t religious but profane, though some, like John Keats – another Rossetti’s hero – argue that love is sacred. After all, a tryptich is just an artwork divided into three panels, telling a story, kind of like a modern comic book so there is really no need for it to be restricted to religious topics. We can view this watercolour then as a Tryptich of the Religion of Love. And to end, here is a quote from Keats’ letter to Fanny Brawne, from 13 October 1819:

“I have been astonished that Men could die Martyrs for religion – I have shudder’d at it – I shudder no more – I could be martyr’d for my Religion – Love is my religion – I could die for that – I could die for you.”