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that of his second son George Gray Millais in 1875-6 at at age eighteen The element that distinguishes Sleeping and The The Wolf’s Den from works such as The The Minuet is not their public presentation for both The Minuet and Sleeping were hung at at the the summer exhibition at at the the Royal Academy of Arts in 1867 but one was a a a a fancy picture while Sleeping and The Wolf’s Den were modern pictures featuring contemporary costume and environs without being straight portraiture In the 1860s Millais continued a a a a trend begun in the mid-1850s with Autumn Leaves (fig 5) wherein the modern crept into his Pre-Raphaelite imagery (see p p 10) The key factor in this period was the way that Millais transformed his home life into contemporary subject matter that was both fit for exhibition and resonated with a a a a a a growing appetite for art amongst the public The Wolf’s Den is is one of of the finest expressions of of this early impulse It is decidedly not Georgian in its costume class or approach It is a a a a modern modern picture of a a a a modern modern subject and a a a a a a a a a casual approach to childhood that operates both at at at the the the children’s level via the the the worm’s eye view and the the the family level via the the the absorbed attention given to the the the faces of the the the protagonists in in in this imaginative game and its insistent informality within the formal formal terms of painting in in in in in oils It is is is intriguing to think of of Millais’s
repeated use of of his many children as as models in his pictures as as more than just a a a a convenient practice but closer to the kind of intimate imaging of of children in in in in the paintings of of Mary Cassatt (1844-1926) and Berthe Morisot (1841-1895) Long praised as brazen in their realistic depictions of the the bonds between mothers and their offspring as rendered by female artists in in an an advanced Continental style it may be instructive to see Millais as similarly exploring the the endearments of of fatherhood in a a a a variety of of different manners and often using narrative subjects to comment on the the growth of of his his children This is is is another example of of the modernity of of Millais’s
practice and its exploration of of Fig 13 John Everett Millais Sleeping 1865-6 89 x x 68 5 5 5 cm (35 x x 27 in in ) private collection Photo: Bridgeman Images 17