49-571: Sir John Everett Millais, 1st Baronet PRA ( UK : / ˈ m ɪ l eɪ / MIL -ay , US : / m ɪ ˈ l eɪ / mil- AY ; 8 June 1829 – 13 August 1896) was an English painter and illustrator who was one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood . He was a child prodigy who, aged eleven, became the youngest student to enter the Royal Academy Schools. The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood
98-405: A hare . Perceiving by our smiles that he had made a mistake, a rabbit was then hazarded. After which I have a faint recollection of a dog or a cat being mentioned." Millais painted the water vole out of the final picture, although a rough sketch of it still exists in an upper corner of the canvas hidden by its frame. In keeping with the tenets of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (PRB), of which he
147-476: A 1936 edition of the French Surrealist journal Minotaure about the artistic movement that inspired the painting. "How could Salvador Dalí fail to be dazzled by the flagrant surrealism of English Pre-Raphaelitism . The Pre-Raphaelite painters bring us radiant women who are, at the same time, the most desirable and most frightening that exist." He later went on to re-interpret Millais's painting in
196-621: A 1973 work entitled Ophelia's Death. In 1906, Japanese novelist Natsume Sōseki called the painting "a thing of considerable beauty" in his novel Kusamakura ; since then, the painting has been highly popular in Japan. It was exhibited in Tokyo in 1998 and travelled there again in 2008. The painting has been widely referred to and pastiched in art, film, and photography, notably in Laurence Olivier 's 1948 film Hamlet , where it formed
245-446: A bough breaks beneath her. She lies in the water singing songs, as if unaware of her danger ("incapable of her own distress"). Her clothes, trapping air, have allowed her to temporarily stay afloat ("Her clothes spread wide, / And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up."). But eventually, "her garments, heavy with their drink, / Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay" down "to muddy death". Ophelia's death has been praised as one of
294-441: A dairymaid in a frolic". Even the great art critic John Ruskin , an avid supporter of Millais, while finding the technique of the painting "exquisite", expressed doubts about the decision to set it in a Surrey landscape and asked, "Why the mischief should you not paint pure nature, and not that rascally wirefenced garden-rolled-nursery-maid's paradise?" In the 20th century, Salvador Dalí wrote glowingly in an article published in
343-454: A full bathtub in his studio at 7 Gower Street in London. As it was now winter, he placed oil lamps under the tub to warm the water, but was so intent on his work that he allowed them to go out. As a result, Siddall caught a severe cold, and her father later sent Millais a letter demanding £50 for medical expenses. According to Millais's son, he eventually accepted a lower sum. When Ophelia
392-422: A kind of "pictorial eco-system". Mariana is a painting that Millais painted in 1850–51 based on the play Measure for Measure by William Shakespeare and the poem of the same name by Alfred, Lord Tennyson , from 1830. In the play, the young Mariana was to be married, but was rejected by her betrothed when her dowry was lost in a shipwreck. This style was promoted by the critic John Ruskin , who had defended
441-442: A letter to a friend, "The flies of Surrey are more muscular, and have a still greater propensity for probing human flesh. I am threatened with a notice to appear before a magistrate for trespassing in a field and destroying the hay ... and am also in danger of being blown by the wind into the water. Certainly the painting of a picture under such circumstances would be greater punishment to a murderer than hanging." By November 1851,
490-562: A prominent Jersey -based family. His parents were John William Millais and Emily Mary Millais (née Evermy). Most of his early childhood was spent in Jersey, to which he retained a strong devotion throughout his life. The author Thackeray once asked him "when England conquered Jersey". Millais replied "Never! Jersey conquered England." The family moved to Dinan in Brittany for a few years in his childhood. His mother's "forceful personality"
539-574: A river just before she drowns. The scene is described in Act IV, Scene VII of Hamlet in a speech by Queen Gertrude . The episode depicted is not usually seen onstage, as in Shakespeare's text it exists only in Gertrude's description. Out of her mind with grief, Ophelia has been making garlands of wildflowers. She climbs into a willow tree overhanging a brook to dangle some from its branches, and
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#1732772018748588-616: A sign for an inn where he used to stay, near to Hayes church (cited in Chums Annual , 1896, page 213). Millais was elected as an associate member of the Royal Academy of Arts in 1853; a decade later in 1863, he was elected as a full member of the Academy, in which he was a prominent and active participant. In July 1885, Queen Victoria created him a baronet , of Palace Gate, in the parish of St Mary Abbot , Kensington , in
637-438: A young couple about to be separated because of religious conflicts. He repeated this theme in many later works. All these early works were painted with great attention to detail, often concentrating on the beauty and complexity of the natural world. In paintings such as Ophelia (1851–52) Millais created dense and elaborate pictorial surfaces based on the integration of naturalistic elements. This approach has been described as
686-584: The Pall Mall Gazette called it "a breezy statue, representing the man in the characteristic attitude in which we all knew him". In 1953, Tate director Norman Reid attempted to have it replaced by Auguste Rodin 's John the Baptist , and in 1962 again proposed its removal, calling its presence "positively harmful". His efforts were frustrated by the statue's owner, the Ministry of Works . Ownership
735-566: The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (known as the "PRB") in September 1847 in his family home on Gower Street , off Bedford Square . Millais's Christ in the House of His Parents (1849–50) was highly controversial because of its realistic portrayal of a working class Holy Family labouring in a messy carpentry workshop. Later works were also controversial, though less so. Millais achieved popular success with A Huguenot (1851–52), which depicts
784-473: The Pre-Raphaelite style to develop a new form of realism in his art. His later works were enormously successful, making Millais one of the wealthiest artists of his day, but some former admirers including William Morris saw this as a sell-out (Millais notoriously allowed one of his paintings to be used for a sentimental soap advertisement). While these and early 20th-century critics, reading art through
833-504: The Pre-Raphaelites against their critics. Millais's friendship with Ruskin introduced him to Ruskin's wife Effie . Soon after they met, she modelled for his painting The Order of Release . As Millais painted Effie, they fell in love. Despite having been married to Ruskin for several years, Effie was still a virgin. Her parents realised something was wrong and she filed for an annulment . In 1855, after her marriage to Ruskin
882-597: The Royal Academy Too Many Requests If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include the details below. Request from 172.68.168.237 via cp1104 cp1104, Varnish XID 188222167 Upstream caches: cp1104 int Error: 429, Too Many Requests at Thu, 28 Nov 2024 05:33:38 GMT Ophelia (painting) Ophelia is an 1851–52 painting by British artist Sir John Everett Millais in
931-620: The Tower (1878) depicting the Princes in the Tower , The Northwest Passage (1874) and the Boyhood of Raleigh (1871). Such paintings indicate Millais's interest in subjects connected to Britain's history and expanding empire. Millais also achieved great popularity with his paintings of children, notably Bubbles (1886) – famous, or perhaps notorious, for being used in the advertising of Pears soap – and Cherry Ripe . His last project (1896)
980-580: The Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, followed by venues in Fukuoka and Tokyo, Japan, and seen by over 660,000 visitors in total. Millais's relationship with Ruskin and Effie has been the subject of several dramas, beginning with the silent film The Love of John Ruskin from 1912. There have also been stage and radio plays and an opera. The 2014 film Effie Gray , written by Emma Thompson , featured Tom Sturridge as Millais. The Pre-Raphaelites have been
1029-722: The artist and Whistler, whose work Millais strongly supported. Other paintings of the late 1850s and 1860s can be interpreted as anticipating aspects of the Aesthetic Movement . Many deploy broad blocks of harmoniously arranged colour and are symbolic rather than narratival. From 1862, the Millais family lived at 7 Cromwell Place, Kensington, London. Later works, from the 1870s onwards demonstrate Millais's reverence for Old Masters such as Joshua Reynolds and Velázquez. Many of these paintings were on an historical theme. Notable among these are The Two Princes Edward and Richard in
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#17327720187481078-441: The artist's connections with Whistler and Albert Moore , and influence on John Singer Sargent . Millais himself argued that as he grew more confident as an artist, he could paint with greater boldness. In his article "Thoughts on our Art of Today" (1888), he recommended Velázquez and Rembrandt as models for artists to follow. Paintings such as The Eve of St. Agnes and The Somnambulist clearly show an ongoing dialogue between
1127-583: The basis for the portrayal of Ophelia's death. The sleeve of the 1971 psychedelic folk album Beautiful Lies You Could Live In by Tom Rapp and Pearls Before Swine reproduces the painting. A scene in Wes Craven 's 1972 film The Last House on the Left was modelled on the painting, while the video for Nick Cave 's song " Where the Wild Roses Grow " depicts Kylie Minogue mimicking the pose of
1176-596: The collection of Tate Britain , London. It depicts Ophelia , a character from William Shakespeare 's play Hamlet , singing before she drowns in a river. The work encountered a mixed response when first exhibited at the Royal Academy , but has since come to be admired as one of the most important works of the mid-nineteenth century for its beauty, its accurate depiction of a natural landscape, and its influence on artists from John William Waterhouse and Salvador Dalí to Peter Blake , Ed Ruscha and Friedrich Heyser . The painting depicts Ophelia singing while floating in
1225-536: The county of Middlesex , and of Saint Ouen , in the Island of Jersey , making him the first artist to be honoured with a hereditary title . After the death of Lord Leighton in 1896, Millais was elected President of the Royal Academy. He died later in the same year from throat cancer . He was buried in the crypt of St Paul's Cathedral . Additionally, between 1881 and 1882, Millais was elected and acted as
1274-465: The early fifties, although the assured handling of his broader, freer later style is equally accomplished in its close observation of scenery. Many were painted elsewhere in Perthshire , near Dunkeld and Birnam , where Millais rented grand houses each autumn to hunt and fish. Christmas Eve , his first full landscape snow scene, painted in 1887, was a view looking towards Murthly Castle . Millais
1323-528: The image. The artwork is also referenced in Fire With Fire , a 1986 film in which a schoolgirl is replicating the central image as the protagonists meet. The imagery of the painting is evoked in the prologue of Lars von Trier 's 2011 film Melancholia , where Kirsten Dunst 's character Justine floats in a slow-moving stream. In 2022, Red Velvet member Joy recreated Ophelia in the music video for Red Velvet's song Feel My Rhythm . Ophelia
1372-568: The landscape has come to be seen as quintessentially English . Ophelia was painted along the banks of the Hogsmill River in Surrey , near Tolworth . Barbara Webb, a resident of nearby Old Malden , devoted much time to finding the exact placement of the picture, and according to her research, the scene is located at Six Acre Meadow, alongside Church Road, Old Malden. Millais Road is now nearby. Millais's close colleague William Holman Hunt
1421-401: The landscape to make the pale Ophelia contrast with the nature behind her. All this is evident in the vivid attention to detail in the brush and trees around Ophelia, the contouring of her face, and the intricate work Millais did on her dress. Millais produced Ophelia in two separate stages: He first painted the landscape, and secondly the figure of Ophelia. Having found a suitable setting for
1470-429: The lens of Modernism , viewed much of his later production as wanting, this perspective has changed in recent decades, as his later works have come to be seen in the context of wider changes and advanced tendencies in the broader late nineteenth-century art world, and can now be seen as predictive of the art world of the present. Millais's personal life has also played a significant role in his reputation. His wife Effie
1519-416: The most poetically written death scenes in literature . Ophelia's pose—her open arms and upwards gaze—also resembles traditional portrayals of saints or martyrs , but has also been interpreted as erotic . The painting is known for its depiction of the detailed flora of the river and the riverbank, stressing the patterns of growth and decay in a natural ecosystem . Despite its nominal Danish setting,
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1568-412: The next twenty years painted a number of scenes of Perthshire where he was annually found hunting and fishing from August until late into the autumn each year. Most of these landscapes are autumnal or early winter in season and show bleak, dank, water-fringed bog or moor, loch, and riverside. Millais never returned to "blade by blade" landscape painting , nor to the vibrant greens of his own outdoor work in
1617-478: The painting's creation, Millais painted a water vole —which an assistant had fished out of the Hogsmill—paddling next to Ophelia. In December 1851, he showed the unfinished painting to Holman Hunt's relatives. He recorded in his diary, "Hunt's uncle and aunt came, both of whom understood most gratifyingly every object except my water rat. The male relation, when invited to guess at it, eagerly pronounced it to be
1666-591: The picture, Millais remained on the banks of the Hogsmill River in Ewell —within a literal stone's throw of where fellow Pre-Raphaelite William Holman Hunt painted The Light of the World —for up to 11 hours a day, six days a week, over a five-month period in 1851. This allowed him to accurately depict the natural scene before him. Millais encountered various difficulties during the painting process. He wrote in
1715-595: The president of the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists . When Millais died in 1896, the Prince of Wales (later to become King Edward VII ) chaired a memorial committee which commissioned a statue of the artist. The statue, by Thomas Brock , was installed at the front of the National Gallery of British Art (now Tate Britain) in the garden on the east side in 1905. On 23 November that year,
1764-481: The subjects of two BBC period dramas . The first, entitled The Love School , was shown in 1975, starring Peter Egan as Millais. The second was Desperate Romantics , in which Millais is played by Samuel Barnett . It was first broadcast on BBC 2 Tuesday, 21 July 2009. Laurie Kynaston portrayed Millais in the Paramount+ adaptation of Elizabeth Macneal 's The Doll Factory (2023). President of
1813-452: The weather had turned windy and snowy. Millais oversaw the building of a hut "made of four hurdles, like a sentry-box, covered outside with straw". According to Millais, sitting inside the hut made him feel like Robinson Crusoe . William Holman Hunt was so impressed by the hut that he had an identical one built for himself. Ophelia was modelled by artist and muse Elizabeth Siddall , then 22 years old. Millais had Siddall lie fully clothed in
1862-745: Was a close friend and muse of the composer Edward Elgar , and is thought to have been an inspiration for themes in his Violin Concerto . Effie's younger sister Sophie Gray sat for several pictures by Millais, prompting some speculation about the nature of their apparently fond relationship. After his marriage, Millais began to paint in a broader style, which was condemned by Ruskin as "a catastrophe". It has been argued that this change of style resulted from Millais's need to increase his output to support his growing family. Unsympathetic critics such as William Morris accused him of "selling out" to achieve popularity and wealth. His admirers, in contrast, pointed to
1911-478: Was a member, Millais used bright colours, gave high attention to detail and faithful truth to nature. This rendition of Ophelia is the epitome of the PRB style; first, because of the subject matter, depicting a woman who has lived a life awaiting happiness, only to find her destiny on the verge of death: the vulnerable woman is a popular subject among Pre-Raphaelite artists. Also, Millais utilizes bright, intense colours in
1960-486: Was also very successful as a book illustrator, notably for the works of Anthony Trollope and the poems of Tennyson . His complex illustrations of the parables of Jesus were published in 1864. His father-in-law commissioned stained-glass windows based on them for Kinnoull Parish Church , Kinnoull . He also provided illustrations for magazines such as Good Words . As a young man, Millais frequently went on sketching expeditions to Keston and Hayes. While there he painted
2009-477: Was annulled, Effie and John Millais married. He and Effie eventually had eight children: Everett, born in 1856; George, born in 1857; Effie, born in 1858; Mary, born in 1860; Alice, born in 1862; Geoffroy, born in 1863; John in 1865; and Sophie in 1868. Their youngest son, John Guille Millais , became a naturalist, wildlife artist, and Millais's posthumous biographer. Their daughter Alice (1862–1936), later Alice Stuart-Worsley after she married Charles Stuart-Worsley ,
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2058-510: Was at the time working on his The Hireling Shepherd nearby. The flowers shown floating on the river were chosen to correspond with Shakespeare's description of Ophelia's garland. They also reflect the Victorian interest in the " language of flowers ", according to which each flower carries a symbolic meaning. The prominent red poppy —not mentioned by Shakespeare's description of the scene—represents sleep and death. At an early stage in
2107-492: Was first publicly exhibited at the Royal Academy in London in 1852, it was not universally acclaimed. A critic in The Times wrote that "there must be something strangely perverse in an imagination which souses Ophelia in a weedy ditch, and robs the drowning struggle of that lovelorn maiden of all pathos and beauty", while a further review in the same newspaper said that "Mr. Millais's Ophelia in her pool ... makes us think of
2156-538: Was formerly married to the critic John Ruskin , who had supported Millais's early work. The annulment of the Ruskin marriage and Effie's subsequent marriage to Millais have sometimes been linked to his change of style, but she became a powerful promoter of his work and they worked in concert to secure commissions and expand their social and intellectual circles. Millais was born in Southampton , England, in 1829, of
2205-417: Was founded at his family home in London, at 83 Gower Street (now number 7). Millais became the most famous exponent of the style, his painting Christ in the House of His Parents (1849–50) generating considerable controversy, and he produced a picture that could serve as the embodiment of the historical and naturalist focus of the group, Ophelia , in 1851–52. By the mid-1850s, Millais was moving away from
2254-522: Was the first of the large-scale Scottish landscapes Millais painted periodically throughout his later career. Usually autumnal and often bleakly unpicturesque, they evoke a mood of melancholy and sense of transience that recalls his cycle-of-nature paintings of the later 1850s, especially Autumn Leaves ( Manchester Art Gallery ) and The Vale of Rest (Tate Britain), though with little or no direct symbolism or human activity to point to their meaning. In 1870 Millais returned to full landscape pictures, and over
2303-565: Was the most powerful influence on his early life. She had a keen interest in art and music, and encouraged her son's artistic bent, promoting the relocating of the family to London to help develop contacts at the Royal Academy of Art. He later said "I owe everything to my mother." In 1840, his artistic talent won him a place at the Royal Academy Schools at the still unprecedented age of eleven. While there, he met William Holman Hunt and Dante Gabriel Rossetti with whom he formed
2352-464: Was to be a painting entitled "The Last Trek". Based on his illustration for his son's book, it depicted a hunter lying dead in the veldt , his body contemplated by two onlookers. His many landscape paintings of this period usually depict difficult or dangerous terrain. The first of these, Chill October (1870, Collection of Andrew Lloyd Webber ), was painted in Perth , near his wife's family home. It
2401-507: Was transferred from the Ministry to English Heritage in 1996, and by them in turn to the Tate. In 2000, under Stephen Deuchar's directorship, the statue was removed to the side of the building to welcome visitors to the refurbished Manton Road entrance. In 2007, the artist was the subject of a major retrospective at Tate Britain, London visited by 151,000 people. The exhibition then traveled to
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