Mural Design - The Wedding Procession of Sir Degrevaunt By Sir Edward Burne-Jones 1860

This study, squared for transfer, is for one of three mural paintings (wedding procession, ceremony and feast) illustrating the romance of Sir Degrevaunt, executed by Burne-Jones in the drawing-room at Red House in the summer of 1860, soon after William and Jane Morris moved in. The Morrises were depicted as Degrevaunt and his bride. The paintings, part of an incomplete series, are still in situ. The story had been published in the Camden Society's volume of Thornton Romances in 1844, and was a favourite with Morris and Burne-Jones.

The Annunciation - Study for the Virgin, Woman holding a Flower By Sir Edward Burne-Jones

This may be an early drawing of Jane Morris. It is now thought to be a study for the Virgin in the Annunciation

http://www.preraphaelites.org/the-collection/1927P586/the-annunciation-study-for-the-virgin-woman-holding-a-flower/

Jane Burden discovered

Jane was 'discovered' in 1857 with Bessie (her sister) at the theatre in Oxford. At the time Oxford did not have a permanent theatre and this was the Drury Lane touring company who performed in the gymnasium in Oriel Street. Jan Marsh says the play was probably Ben Bolt which I can't trace. It was not very respectable for girls on their own to visit the theater until the end of the century. 

According to]. W. Mackail, Life of William Morris) OUP ed. 1950, i, '40,
it was Rossetti and Edward Burne-Jones who first met Jane Burden. Lady
Burne-Jones, in her Memorials of Edward Burne-fones, 1904. i, 168, states that
Rossetti, Burne-Jones, Arthur Hughes and William Morris were all at the
theatre together when the meeting took place.

May Morris (previously known as 'Jane Morris') by Edward Burne-Jones 1880's

Cabinet Decorated with Scenes from ‘The Prioress’s Tale’

Cabinet Decorated with Scenes from ‘The Prioress’s Tale’, Philip Webb and Edward Burne-Jones. This cabinet, designed by Philip Webb and decorated by Burne-Jones, is made from oak and deal and painted in oil. Burne-Jones gave it to William Morris as a wedding present on his marriage to Jane Burden in 1859. This cabinet stood in the Morris' bedroom at Red House

Panel by Edward Burne-Jones, originally placed in the front door of Red House, the painted glass surrounding it is by William Morris.

The Seat of a Bishop

This is fascinating, a sketch by Ned that he gave to Jane. Shows both had a sense of humour. Called The Seat of a Bishop; inspired by the Baedeker's Guide to Italy. Ned went to Italy four times (as did Jane). An inscription asks Jane not to show the sketch "to your lady friends because they would think ill of me."

Head Study

Jane Morris - Head Study, 1863 - 1864

This study of Jane Morris, wife of Burne-Jones's best friend and colleague, William Morris, may have been a study for 'Green Summer', a watercolour of 1864 (Private Collection) where she appears seated amongst a group of girls.

Red chalk over pencil

May by Ned

Edward Coley Burne-Jones - The Golden Stairs 1880

This painting is an example of Edward Burne-Jones’s interest in investigating a mood rather than telling a story. He deliberately made his pictures enigmatic and the meaning of this painting has provoked much debate. One view is that the eighteen women are spirits in an enchanted dream. The painting might also be purely decorative. The underlying idea, popularised in the 1870s by the critic Walter Pater, is that ‘all the arts aspire to the condition of music’. 

There are 18 women and May's face is 8th from the top, holding the violin. 

Other faces are modelled on Frances Graham, Laura Tennant, Mary Millais and Margaret Burne-Jones. Antonia Caiva, a professional model often used by Ned was used for their bodies.

The canvas is 9 feet high by 4 wide. First exhibited at the Grovesner Gallery, 1880.

Mural Design - The Wedding Procession of Sir Degrevaunt

Mural Design - The Wedding Procession of Sir Degrevaunt
By Sir Edward Burne-Jones
1860

This study, squared for transfer, is for one of three mural paintings (wedding procession, ceremony and feast) illustrating the romance of Sir Degrevaunt, executed by Burne-Jones in the drawing-room at Red House in the summer of 1860, soon after William and Jane Morris moved in. The Morrises were depicted as Degrevaunt and his bride. The paintings, part of an incomplete series, are still in situ. The story had been published in the Camden Society's volume of Thornton Romances in 1844, and was a favourite with Morris and Burne-Jones.

Detail from The Tale of Sir Degrevaunt

Detail from The Tale of Sir Degrevaunt: The Wedding Ceremony by Burne Jones, 1860, paint on plaster

Wedding Feast by Burne Jones

Detail from the Wedding Feast by Burne Jones (in the Drawing Room at Red House) - King and Queen modelled by William and Janey

Dante Gabriel Rossetti bringing cushions to Jane Morris

Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones
Dante Gabriel Rossetti bringing cusions to Jane Morris
pencil


Provenance
Maria Zambaco and by descent in the family

The present drawing was one of a group of sketches and caricatures from the collection of Burne-Jones's model and muse Maria Zambaco. An exceptionally beautiful member of the London Greek community, his affair with her began in the late 1860s and lasted about three years. The impact of the affair on Burne-Jones was profound and his drawings of her have a sadness and air of unearthly beauty about them. The affair between Burne-Jones and Maria Zambaco can be compared to Rossetti's relationships with Lizzie Siddall and then with Jane Morris, the wife of William Morris, pictured here. Like Rossetti, Burne-Jones saw Maria as symbol of his muse as much as a reality.

In the present drawing Burne-Jones, with his characteristic trait of satire, has depicted a rather portly Rossetti hurrying to the attention of a rather fey Jane Morris. Rossetti and Jane first became close while she was sitting for the figure of Queen Guinevere in the Oxford Union murals. However Rossetti was already engaged to Lizzie Siddall, who he married in May 1860. However not long afterwards in February 1962 Lizzie died of a laudanum overdose. William Morris at this time was heavily wrapped up in his work, so the stage was set for a renewal of Rossetti and Jane's Morris's former intimacy. In 1865 she was sitting to him for drawings and by 1868 he was working on a formal portrait. She was the model for his striking pastel of 1869, Pandora, Christie's, London, 14 June 2000, lot 14 (sold £2,400,000). Between 1870 and 1874 they contrived to spend as much time together as they could at Kelmscott Manor, the house which Morris and Rossetti had taken joint tenancy of. However Jane later maintained that the affair remained at the level of passionate romantic attachment rather than anything more physical.

http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/sir-edward-coley-burne-jones-bt-ara-dante/4110011/lot/lot_details.aspx?from=searchresults&intObjectID=4110011&sid=29ccab43-2054-4548-aedd-110b7f5db4cb




from the collection of 

Mark Samuels Lasner

Senior Research Fellow

University of Delaware Library

181 South College Avenue

Newark, DE 19717

Tel (302) 831-3250

marksl@udel.edu

biblio@aol.com

Topsy talking to Jane

The Golden Stairs

Roger Homan (Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Brighton) talks about Jane and Rossetti " In Rossetti's painting she is always evident as Jane Burden. For Burne-Jones, however, Jane Burden becomes a type: her image appears in The Golden Stairs (1876-80, Tate) not as an individual study but several times within a host. He borrows her image so often and uses it in such moderation that we have now become accustomed to a new generation of angels."

The Morris Society did a very good paper on this lovely painting:
http://www.morrissociety.org/publications/JWMS/AU98.13.1.Gilhooly.pdf

Goldfish Pool

Goldfish Pool, 1861
Burne-Jones Gouache

William Morris’ design skills extended to dress. This model is wearing a dress which Morris designed for his future wife to wear in one of his paintings. The dress is unconventional for the time, but typical of the style popularised by the Pre-Raphaelites. The setting for this picture is possibly the Red House. Burne-Jones’ use of rich colours and his design for the frame owe much to Rossetti.

This is one of a series of beautiful women painted by Burne-Jones in the 1860s. It was commissioned by George Price Boyce in 1861. The model is sitting on the low wall of a pool filled with goldfish. William Morris designed the dress she is wearing for his future wife, Jane Burden, to pose in his paintings La Belle Iseult and Guinevere prior to their marriage in 1859. The setting for this picture is possibly William Morris’s new home - The Red House, Bexleyheath, Kent. The house was designed by Philip Webb in 1859 for Morris and his new wife Jane Burden.

Keeping to the medieval theme, Burne-Jones also designed medieval rosettes for the picture frame which was possibly made by his father, Edward Richard Jones.

This picture demonstrates Burne-Jones’s prime interest in colour. He used watercolour for much of his work in the 1860s because of the small scale it offered. Inspired by Rossetti’s unconventional technique he achieved a wide range of effects. He mixed watercolour with gum and scratched, sponged and blotted the wet colour.

Burne-Jones is a major late Pre-Raphaelite painter. This rare early watercolour has glowing jewel-like colours. The model is wearing an unconventional style of dress popularised by the Pre-Raphaelites.

There are these inscriptions on the exhibit:

E.B. Jones, this is a watercolour so don't varnish it
Girl in an Orchard by E Burne-Jones watercolour 11 3/8 inches x 8 3/8 inches

Tullie House Museum and Art Gallery collection, bequest of Emily and Gordon Bottomley 1949

Brompton cemetary

Brompton cemetary

http://www.londongardensonline.org.uk/gardens-online-record.asp?ID=KAC021

Leyland commissioned The Beguiling of Merlin, a painting by the Pre-Raphaelite painter Edward Burne-Jones, which was created between 1872 and 1877. The painting depicts a scene from Arthurian legend, the infatuation of Merlin with the Lady of the Lake, Nimue. Merlin is shown trapped, helpless in a hawthorn bush as Nimue reads from a book of spells.

Annunciation

The Annunciation - Study for the Virgin, Woman holding a Flower
By Sir Edward Burne-Jones
1859 – 1861

Pencil on paper
This may be an early drawing of Jane Morris. It is now thought to be a study for the Virgin in the Annunciation, also in Birmingham's collection

http://www.preraphaelites.org/the-collection/1927P586/the-annunciation-study-for-the-virgin-woman-holding-a-flower/

Meeting Jane

In the warm summer of 1857, Rossetti and Ned went to a performance of the musical comedy Ben Bolt being staged by the Drury Lane company in a temporary theatre (in a gymnasium) in Oriel Street, Oxford. There Rossetti spotted two beautiful young girls. One was tall and elegant with tightly waved black hair. Gabriel was struck by her skin which he later called 'dark pearl'. She had sloe eyes and steep cheek bones which he thought looked Greek or even Gypsy. Her sister was very pretty too but in a more 'ordinary' way.
They approached the girls after the curtain fell and Rossetti asked Jane to come to his rooms in George Street to model the next day. Jane was 17, her sister 15. Jane agreed but never showed up but Ned ran into her again a few days later. Her Father had objected so ned and Rossetti called at his house in St Helen's passage and persuaded Jane's parents.

Rossetti immediately changed his mural Guinevere drawings from Lizzie's face to Jane's.