The Lady of Shalott, 1888-1905, by William Holman Hunt
The work measures 188.3 cm × 146.4 cm (74.1 in × 57.6 in) is signed with a monogram to the lower left.
The painting depicts the moment immediately after the Lady of Shalott has looked directly out of her window at Sir Launcelot, as her fate begins to unwind. She is standing within her circular loom, with an unfinished and indistinct tapestry intended to represent Galahad presenting the Holy Grail to Arthur, However, the weaving is breaking, trapping her in its threads. She is wearing a brightly coloured bodice over a cream chemise, with a pink skirt. Her feet are bare, with her slip-on pattens nearby, and her long hair has whipped up wildly above her head.
Disturbed from their perch, a pair of doves are flying past a large silver candlestick, while another pair escape through an upper window. Behind her is the large round mirror that she had used to observe the world outside her tower, but it has "crack'd from side to side": the reflection shows Launcelot riding past, and the pillars of the Lady's window. The irises littering the floor indicate that her purity is stained.
To her left is an oval roundel of the adoration of the Christ Child by Mary (representing humility), based on a work by Lucca della Robbia that Hunt owned.[3] The roundel on her right shows a haloed Hercules (representing valour) during his labour to take apples from the garden of the Hesperides, who slept while their guardian serpent (under Hercules's left foot) was defeated.[4] As a study for this detail, Hunt made an actual plaster bas-relief, now in the Manchester Art Gallery. The Hesperides' failure in their duty mirrors the lady’s.
Above the roundels is a frieze of a stylised sky, containing cherubs and haloed female figures guiding planets and a sphere of stars. One of the angelic beings stomps on a serpent. The frieze symbolizes harmony and patience, values that Hunt believed the lady should have possessed.