Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art – John Keats

by Cedric | Jun 26, 2022 | Art, General

One of Keats’ last poems tells the tale of his doomed love for Fanny Brawne.

Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art—

         Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night

And watching, with eternal lids apart,

         Like nature’s patient, sleepless Eremite,

The moving waters at their priestlike task

         Of pure ablution round earth’s human shores,

Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask

         Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—

No—yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,

         Pillow’d upon my fair love’s ripening breast,

To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,

         Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,

Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,

And so live ever—or else swoon to death.

La Belle Dame Sans Merci – Dicksee & Keats

by Cedric | Jun 18, 2022 | Art, General

Frank Bernard Dicksee (1853–1928) created this beautiful work after reading Keats’ 1819 poem, or ballad, of the same name. This is quoted below. The poem itself is a sort of fairy tale gone awry. The knight at arms finds a women who is ostensibly in love with him, only to find her deserting him after their first and only night together. The poem itself is quite frappant and I shall leave you to read it.

O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,

       Alone and palely loitering?

The sedge has withered from the lake,

       And no birds sing.

O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,

       So haggard and so woe-begone?

The squirrel’s granary is full,

       And the harvest’s done.

I see a lily on thy brow,

       With anguish moist and fever-dew,

And on thy cheeks a fading rose

       Fast withereth too.

I met a lady in the meads,

       Full beautiful—a faery’s child,

Her hair was long, her foot was light,

       And her eyes were wild.

I made a garland for her head,

       And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;

She looked at me as she did love,

       And made sweet moan

I set her on my pacing steed,

       And nothing else saw all day long,

For sidelong would she bend, and sing

       A faery’s song.

She found me roots of relish sweet,

       And honey wild, and manna-dew,

And sure in language strange she said—

       ‘I love thee true’.

She took me to her Elfin grot,

       And there she wept and sighed full sore,

And there I shut her wild wild eyes

       With kisses four.

And there she lullèd me asleep,

       And there I dreamed—Ah! woe betide!—

The latest dream I ever dreamt

       On the cold hill side.

I saw pale kings and princes too,

       Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;

They cried—‘La Belle Dame sans Merci

       Thee hath in thrall!’

I saw their starved lips in the gloam,

       With horrid warning gapèd wide,

And I awoke and found me here,

       On the cold hill’s side.

And this is why I sojourn here,

       Alone and palely loitering,

Though the sedge is withered from the lake,

       And no birds sing.

Dicksee, Frank; La belle dame sans merci; Bristol Museums, Galleries & Archives

This splendid painting captures the moment after the knight at arms places the belle dame on his steed, and she leans over singing a faery’s song. We can see the garland on her head and the bracelets made by the knight on her head and arms, respectively. The knight is besotted with his new beloved. The expression on his face and the possessiveness with which he grips onto the horse are both evident in the painting’s rendering. The horse seems to be the only one who is with the programme and sees what is coming, having bowed his head in shame, almost.

The knight’s armour is done beautifully. I should note that while Dicksee was never a member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, his work does show the extent of their influence on his artistic vision. The lighting, the subject matter, the beautiful colours, the red flowing hair of the belle dame herself – all of these elements form a striking picture. The portrait in my view does homage to Keats’ masterful poem.

The predominant mood is one of enchantment, intensified by the idyllic setting of the English countryside: ‘I met a lady in the meads, Full beautiful – a faery’s child, Her hair was long, her foot was light, And her eyes were wild… I set her on my pacing steed, And nothing else saw all day long; For side long would she bend, and sing A faery’s song.’ A fascination with chivalry had lasted throughout the nineteenth century, typically combining romantic escapism with a cautionary note of the ‘femme fatale’. Art UK

I shall leave it to my dearest to explain the vicissitudes of Monsieur Keats’ poetry. I was quite taken aback by this poem on second and third reading. It is beautifully crafted, symmetrical and pierces through the reader. The reader finds him or herself on the hill, with the knight at arms, alone and deserted, bereft of swiftly developed love. These two are a beautiful combination of art forms, I am grateful to Charlotte for sharing these with me.

The Finding of the Saviour in the Temple – William Holman Hunt

by Cedric | May 17, 2022 | Art, General

Once again, I am in the debt of my darling Charlotte for convincing me, in spectacular fashion, to let go of my reticence vis a vis Pre-Raphaelite art. This painting depicts an important moment in the Gospel of Luke. It is also the fifth of the Joyous Mysteries of the Holy Rosary. In the passage, quoted below, Mary and Joseph are on their return from Jerusalem, after celebrating Passover, when they notice Jesus is missing. They turn back to Jerusalem and find Him in the Temple, in discussion with teachers and doctors. This is an important passage in the Gospels as it sheds light on Jesus’ youth, and indeed is the only passage which mentions this hidden period of the saviour’s life.

As Charlotte wrote in her splendid post on Isabella and the Pot of Basil, by the very same artist:

The painter responsible for this bizarre delight is William Holman Hunt (1827-1910), one of the founding members of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. As their name suggests, the group of artists and their followers sought a return to the style of art that had flourished before Raphael. They favoured exquisite detail and vibrant colour over what they perceived to be the dull conventions of the day, and they often took inspiration from the Bible and works of literature for their striking pictures.

The passage from the Gospel of Luke is below:

The Boy Jesus in the Temple.

41 Every year his parents used to go to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover. 42 And when Jesus was twelve years old, they made the journey as usual for the feast. 43 When the days of the feast were over and they set off for home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem. His parents were not aware of this. 44 Assuming that he was somewhere in the group of travelers, they journeyed for a day. Then they started to look for him among their relatives and friends, 45 but when they failed to find him, they returned to Jerusalem to search for him. 46 After three days they found him in the temple, where he was sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. 47 And all who heard him were amazed at his intelligence and his answers. 48 When they saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him: “Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been searching for you with great anxiety.” 49 Jesus said to them, “Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” 50 But they did not comprehend what he said to them. 51 Jesus Grows in Wisdom and Grace. Then he went down with them and came to Nazareth, and he was obedient to them. His mother pondered all these things in her heart. 52 And Jesus increased in wisdom and in age and in grace with God and men.

This painting is turbulently mind blowing. There is such a wealth of sumptuous beauty that I do not know where to direct my gaze. Jesus is the centre piece of my life and this painting, so I suppose I should begin there. Dressed in regal blue, and with faint glow behind his head, he is the subject of the audience’s rapt attention. His face is spotless and free from anguish, in sharp contrast to Mary, his mother, who must have been worried sick. Jesus’ earthly father, Joseph, is not best pleased. I imagine this painting was depicting the moment after Jesus said to his father “Did you not know that I must be about my Father’s work?”. Note the capitalisation of the F. Jesus is reminding St Joseph that he is is not Jesus’ Father in heaven. Joseph’s consternation at this reprimand is visible in the painting.

Moving on, then, to the background of the temple. The gold and colourful jewels, and the lattice patterns are rendered with such delicate care that one is left breathless. Holman Hunt was focussed on creating ethnographically accurate pieces of art. The doctors and rabbis are modelled after local people in the Middle East, where Holman Hunt travelled. As well as studying the local people, he studied ancient Judaic customs and rituals. Their expressions in the painting, varying between consternation and fascination, capture the panoply of reaction they must have had to the child Jesus. The colours, the details and the thoughtfulness which has gone into this piece is overwhelming.

I believe Holman Hunt will have been familiar with, and taken inspiration from, Bernardino Luini’s Christ Among the Doctors, pictured below. The below captures with similar masterfulness, the varied reaction to the child Jesus’ questioning and conversation with men supposedly older and wiser than He.

Bernardino Luini – Christ Among the Doctors

[The] Religious art of Hunt is a unique piece of creation, and represent[s] a great opportunity to understand the idea of morality in the Pre-Raphaelite era and the ambition of the whole movement in delivering of their message. The Bunget

Like my beautiful Charlotte, I could talk endlessly about this painting. Indeed I hope to have it framed somewhere in my home so I can admire it endlessly. But alas, I will stop here. More Pre-Raphaelite art to come!

Isabella and the Pot of Basil – William Holman Hunt

by Charlotte Evans | May 9, 2022 | Art, General

It is fitting that my first contribution to this blog combines two of my great passions in art – John Keats and the work of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood – with a special moment that came about with the same ‘Wes Anderson magic’ that, for Cedric and me, has characterised the last six months of our lives.

On a chilly, bright March weekend, we visited Newcastle. I had never been so far north, and I was astonished by the city’s beauty. With an hour to spare, Cedric and I stumbled into the Laing Art Gallery. I was excited to see the painting under discussion printed on the outside wall of the gallery, so we had to go in for a peek. Being an avid Keatsian (in spite of my ongoing PhD in Keats studies) and a lover of Pre-Raphaelite art, I was dazzled by meeting this painting in person, as I had admired it for years on the cover of my Oxford World Classics Keats.

The painter responsible for this bizarre delight is William Holman Hunt (1827-1910), one of the founding members of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. As their name suggests, the group of artists and their followers sought a return to the style of art that had flourished before Raphael. They favoured exquisite detail and vibrant colour over what they perceived to be the dull conventions of the day, and they often took inspiration from the Bible and works of literature for their striking pictures. I could write forever of their paintings, poetry, beliefs and eccentricity – you can expect many more posts recommending their work.

Hunt took his subject here, as you may have guessed, from a poem by John Keats entitled Isabella, or The Pot of Basil. Keats adapted the story from a tale in Boccaccio’s Decameron, a collection of 100 tales by the celebrated Italian poet. The eponymous Isabella falls in love with Lorenzo, an employee of her cruel brothers who had intended to marry her ‘to some high noble and his olive trees’. Her brothers learn of their love and murder Lorenzo, burying him in the woods. After Lorenzo appears to Isabella in a dream, Isabella digs up Lorenzo’s head and buries it in a pot of basil. In Hunt’s painting, we can see a visual depiction of Keats’s words:

And she forgot the stars, the moon, and sun,

And she forgot the blue above the trees,

And she forgot the dells where waters run,

And she forgot the chilly autumn breeze;

She had no knowledge when the day was done,

And the new morn she saw not: but in peace

Hung over her sweet Basil evermore,

And moisten’d it with tears unto the core.

The poem ends after her brothers steal the pot of basil from her, having deduced that it contains Lorenzo’s head and evidence of their crime, and Isabella dies ‘forlorn,/ Imploring for her basil to the last’. 

Why do I like such a macabre painting and poem? Well, the painting’s sumptuousness is obvious, from the luscious basil leaves concealing their dark secret to the vibrant blanket laid over the prie-dieu that has become Isabella’s altar to Lorenzo. The poem is a fanciful tale, but nonetheless taps into relatable human emotions of grief, anger, distraction, and heartbreak and renders them beautifully.

On reading around the painting, I was touched to discover that Hunt begun the painting while in Florence with his wife, Fanny, who was pregnant. She died after giving birth, and Hunt immortalised her in Isabella’s features in a strange reversal of roles – Isabella’s features, those of Hunt’s wife, are hauntingly blank with grief, but perhaps Hunt was channelling some of his own grief here. The basil pot and the painting itself are curiously united, both being built and nourished by melancholy, both providing life in place of death. It was the idea of immortality through art that inspired some of Keats’s most famous poems, and although I believe in an immortality beyond plants that may wither and paintings that may burn, it is deeply human to seek life over death, even in the midst of sorrow.

So, if you find yourself in Newcastle, have a poke around the Laing. You will see this nearly 2m-high masterpiece, as well as a wall of teapots and teacups that delighted me almost as much. 

The Incredulity of Saint Thomas – Caravaggio

by Cedric | Apr 24, 2022 | Art, General

Today is the second Sunday of Easter, known as Low Sunday. The Gospel reading at Mass is St Thomas doubting the resurrected Jesus in in fact the risen Lord. I have included the reading below (emphasis added). I did a post on The Incredulity of Saint Thomas by Rubens, which so moved me at the Rijksmuseum. This other masterwork was accomplished by Caravaggio. It is now in the Sanssouci Picture Gallery, in Potsdam, Germany.

Gospel John 20:19-31

In the evening of that same day, the first day of the week, the doors were closed in the room where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews. Jesus came and stood among them. He said to them, ‘Peace be with you’, and showed them his hands and his side. The disciples were filled with joy when they saw the Lord, and he said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. ‘As the Father sent me, so am I sending you.’

After saying this he breathed on them and said: ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. For those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven; for those whose sins you retain, they are retained.’ Thomas, called the Twin, who was one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. When the disciples said, ‘We have seen the Lord’, he answered, ‘Unless I see the holes that the nails made in his hands and can put my finger into the holes they made, and unless I can put my hand into his side, I refuse to believe.’ Eight days later the disciples were in the house again and Thomas was with them.

The doors were closed, but Jesus came in and stood among them. ‘Peace be with you’ he said. Then he spoke to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here; look, here are my hands. Give me your hand; put it into my side. Doubt no longer but believe.’ Thomas replied, ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘You believe because you can see me. Happy are those who have not seen and yet believe.’

There were many other signs that Jesus worked and the disciples saw, but they are not recorded in this book. These are recorded so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing this you may have life through his name.

This 1602 painting is unquestionably a masterpiece. The risen Christ, whom we acclaim and celebrate in this Easter time, appears to St Thomas and asks him to put his hand in Jesus’ side in order to believe that he has indeed been raised form the dead. In so doing, Christ has defeated death, not only for himself but for all of the faithful. This is truly the cornerstone of the Christian faith so it was important that the artist did this moment justice. I believe he did.

You can see that St Thomas is the central figure in this painting. His strained belief can be seen by the wrinkles in his forehead. Behind him are most likely St Peter and St John the Evangelist. The lack of halo on Christ’s head emphasises his corporeal form. The Rubens painting of the same scene showed a faint glow behind Christ’s head but no halo.

There is heavy chiaroscuro throughout the painting, increasing the drama of the scene. Jesus is depicted brightly, as though the shadow is cast by light emanating from him. All of the fabric is rendered beautifully and the painting has a generally quite striking aspect. This is indeed very moving for me. Modern Christians, of course, have not seen the risen Christ. I do count myself among the number who are blessed for not seeing, and yet believing. I hope this painting helped viewers throughout the last 420 years to feel similarly moved and compelled.

Madonna and Child – Sassoferrato

by Cedric | Apr 21, 2022 | Art, General

I am writing on Good Friday. I was looking through my Rosary booklet, which my wonderful Charlotte provided to me when we started dating, just confirm that I had the right mystery to pray (Sorrowful Mysteries, of course). In so doing, I came across a painting by Sassoferrato which struck me.

Giovan Battista Salvi known, from his town of origin in the Marche, as Sassoferrato, shows the Madonna seated on the clouds with her feet resting on the half moon. She embraces the Child Jesus who holds in his hands a rosary that ends in a rose. Heads of cherubs rise from the clouds. The image confirms the stylistic elements that characterize his vast production of subjects of a religious nature: images of a solid formal layout with brilliant and almost enamelled colours.

Musei Vaticani