Page 27 - Demo

Fig 23 John Everett Millais Cherry Ripe 1879 1341⁄2 x x 89 cm (53 x x 35 in ) private collection linearity of the Pre-Raphaelite style towards more painterly brushwork and the use of a a a lower-toned colour palette In some cases Millais paid direct homage to a a a a a a a particular artist His Diploma picture for the Royal Academy Souvenir of Velázquez 1868 (Royal Academy fig 22) for example with its darkened background and pose recalling Velázquez’s full-length portraits of the Infanta Margarita was a a a a direct pictorial reference to to the the work of the the Spanish artist 3 In a a a a a similar vein Millais’s picture of a a a a a young girl in in a a a mob-cap Cherry Ripe 1879 (private collection fig 23) is a a a direct quotation from Reynolds’s portrait of Penelope Boothby 1788 (private collection currently on on loan to Ashmolean Museum Oxford fig 24) a a a work which Millais may well have seen as as it was owned by one of his patrons Benjamin Godfrey Windus (1790-1867) The Wolf’s Den sits on the cusp of this period with its its formal qualities in in in fact revealing links with Millais’s past
Fig 24 Sir Joshua Reynolds Penelope Boothby 1788 private collection Photo: Bridgeman Images but also projecting into the the future We cannot forget the the residual influence of Pre-Raphaelite techniques with Millais’s exquisite precision in in his naturalistic detailing of the children’s clothes and the the the scalloped edge of the the the fur covering worn by Everett Millais However the attention to formal decorative qualities over and and above literary and and anecdotal meanings demonstrates Millais’s Aesthetic interests which became apparent in in in his paintings from the mid-1850s onwards It is no coincidence that the undulating forms of The Wolf’s Den strongly mirror the the grouping of figures in in the the earlier more demonstrably Aesthetic painting Spring 1858-9
(fig 10) In both works the frieze-like tableau of figures are pushed to the the the foreground of the the the picture focusing the the the viewer’s eyes on on on the action of its protagonists The Wolf’s Den is of course markedly different from Spring in in other ways and exemplifies the developments in Millais’s style over just a a a few years In distinction from the high tone and multiple colour variations of the earlier picture in The Wolf’s 27