Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882)

Rossetti was most notable for being among the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. In fact, his Girlhood of Mary the Virgin was the first painting to bear the mysterious initials "PRB" after the signature in 1849. It was not until a year later that Rossetti made public the meaning of the initials at which time a firestorm of controversy erupted in which Rossetti and his fellow Pre-Raphaelites were accused of being romanists, blasphemers, atheists, and worse, most notably in a rather shoddy and vicious attack by Dickens on Milais's Christ in the House of his Parents. Most of his early works featured Elizabeth Siddal (who also posed for Millais and Hunt) whom he married in 1860. Two years later she died of an apparently suicidal overdose of laudanum and Rossetti became a virtual recluse and chloral hydrate addict. He was overcome with grief and guilt over having not been attentive enough to his wife and at the funeral he placed the only copy of his complete works of poetry in the coffin with her (in emulation of a story written by his sister Christina Rossetti some 12 years earlier). After Elizabeth's death, his principal subject was William Morris's wife Jane whose full-lipped sultry beauty has become most associated with his name and which generated significant criticism at the time. In 1870 after much soul-searching he had the body of of Elizabeth exhumed to retrieve his book of poetry, much of which was subsequently published. He died 12 years later in 1882 at a resort near Margate in Kent.

His works are displayed in Aberdeen, Boston, Bournemouth, Cambridge (Fitzwm), Cambridge Mass. (Fogg), Dublin, Edinburgh, Hamburg, Liverpool, London, (NPG, Tate, and V&A), Manchester, New York (Met. Mus.), Ottawa, Wilmington Delaware, and Yale (CBA) .

There is a rather extensive archive of Rossetti information available elsewhere, but the quality of the drawings and paintings there is rather inferior. It does have some poetry and lots of historical details though.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882)

Beata Beatrix (c. 1863) (32K)

Monna Vanna (1866) (73K)

Proserpine (1877) (51K)

The Bower Meadow (1872) (32K)

Ecce Ancilla Domini (The Annunciation) (1849) (64K), Birmingham City Museum

La Ghirlandata (1873) (78K), Guildhall Art Gallery, London

Venus Verticordia (1864-1868) (98K) Russell-Cotes Art Gallery and Museum, East Cliff Bournemouth, England

Joan of Arc Kisses the Sword of Liberation (1863) (81K)

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