May 12 is the birthday of Dante Gabriel Rossetti.
Dante Gabriel Rossetti was born in London in 1828. His first interests were manuscript illumination and poetry. Rossetti started studying art in 1841, then in 1845 began studying at the Antique School of the Royal Academy of Art in London. Then Rossetti studied with his life-long friend Ford Madox Brown. In 1848, Rossetti jointed the studio of William Holman Hunt.
In 1848, Rossetti, William Holman Hunt and J.E. Millais formed the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Rossetti’s Girlhood of Mary Virgin (above) was the first painting to be exhibited with the initials of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood: PRB. The Pre-Raphaelites disdained contemporary British art and wanted to restore, what they considered, the more authentic and simple art before Raphael (Rafaello Sanzio, 1483-1520). The Pre-Raphaelites believed Raphael was the epitome of rigid Academic art. Like Rossetti, the Pre-Raphaelites were fans of the poetry of Alfred Lord Tennyson and John Keats, whose work inspired their art. The Pre-Raphaelites published a journal: The Germ.
The harsh criticism to which his work was subjected convinced Rossetti to exhibit in public only occasionally after 1850. He also started painting in watercolor more than oils. In 1854, Rossetti met an important art critic who became his advocate: John Ruskin. Through Ruskin, Rossetti met many patrons and collectors.
His wife had a still-born child and died of a drug overdose in 1862. Rossetti wrote a series of poems to her, which were buried in her coffin. But in 1869, Rossetti had them exhumed and published. At about this time, Rossetti started painting in oil again. He was a popular and successful portrait painter.
Rossetti’s poetry was subjected to indecorous criticism in 1870. In his final years, Rossetti lived alone, shunning company, addicted to drugs and alcohol, surrounded by a menagerie of wild animals, including a wombat, to whom he dedicated a poem. Rossetti painted until his death. He died in 1882. Rossetti’s work was immensely influential and encouraged a later group of Pre-Raphaelite artists.
