F. G. Stephens's contributions to Rossetti's 'Ecce Ancilla Domini!'

On the evening of 16 December 1849, Frederic George Stephens went to Dante Gabriel Rossetti's studio 'to do [Rossetti's] perspective'.[1] One month earlier, Stephens had offered 'to draw in the perspective scale of Gabriel's picture'.[2] The picture was an Annunciation subject that Rossetti had been planning for some time. It's now in the Tate and is known by its slightly fiddly Latin title, Ecce Ancilla Domini! (meaning 'Behold, the handmaiden of the Lord!'). It's recognised as a defining example of early Pre-Raphaelite painting, frequently discussed, reproduced and exhibited.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Ecce Ancilla Domini! (The annunciation), 1849–50, oil on canvas, 72.4 x 41.9 cm, Tate, London.

Many years later, William Michael declared that his brother Gabriel 'never paid any attention' to matters of perspective, also recalling that Stephens 'did something to arrange the perspective of [Ecce Ancilla Domini!]'.[3] Although these recollections were written some forty years later, they are confirmed to some extent by the original diary entries from the winter of 1849 quoted above. That Stephens had a hand in this famous picture's creation has not often been recognised, despite the fact it's recorded in the primary sources about the PRB. The fact is not mentioned in authoritative texts like Virginia Surtees's catalogue raisonné of Rossetti's works (1971), or the Tate's book Pre-Raphaelite Painting Techniques (2004) which includes a detailed examination of the painting's creation.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Study for 'Ecce Ancilla Domini!', ca. 1849, pencil on paper, 19.4 x 13.7 cm, Tate, London.

As Jerome McGann notes, one of the most radical aspects of Ecce Ancilla Domini! is its manipulation of perspective: '[Rossetti's] notorious disconnect with rules of perspective has been poorly understood by later critics and art historians, who fail to see that his impatience with systematic illusionism is a function of his attachment to other techniques of pictorial spatialization'.[4] Elizabeth Prettejohn has also pointed out that '[t]he awkward angle of the perspective recession [...] cannot quite be dismissed as technically inept'.[5] In other words, the artists were rejecting the traditional, Royal Academy-approved methods of composing a picture – particularly one depicting a sacred subject. The oddly sloping floor, the angle of the bed that seems to be tipping towards us, the fact that we can't clearly distinguish where the floor ends and the wall begins – these quirks were inspired by 'primitive' Italian paintings from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Evidently, Stephens was directly involved with adding these quirks into Rossetti's painting – 'doing something to arrange the perspective', as William Michael put it.

Exactly how much 'arranging' Stephens did – how much it was his idea to warp the perspective after the manner of actual pre-Raphaelite paintings – is difficult to know. Was it a pictorial effect that Rossetti knew he wanted to achieve but didn't know how to execute? Why did he ask Stephens to help him – or, perhaps, why did Stephens offer to help? Was Rossetti simply being lazy, taking advantage of his friend's kind offer? What did Stephens bring to Rossetti's Annunciation? So many questions!

A visual clue may come from a painting by Stephens himself, Mother and child, now also in the Tate:

Frederic George Stephens, Mother and child, ca. 1854–6, oil on canvas, 47 x 64.1 cm, Tate, London.

Several art historians have been at pains to point out the awkwardness of Stephens's perspective drawing in this painting – and I agree that there are flaws here (not that they detract from the painting as a whole). The junction of the two walls on the far left doesn't quite make sense, and the one wall does not line up with the corresponding section on the far right. When Stephens makes mistakes, he's dismissed as a bad artist; when similar mistakes are made by Rossetti (or attributed to him), they're radical and thought-provoking, a challenge to the conventions of Western painting. Oddly, though, the 'faults' of Stephens's Mother and child may help us to navigate the difficulties we're faced with when looking at Ecce Ancilla Domini!. As is noted in the analysis of the painting in Pre-Raphaelite Painting Techniques:

... care was not taken to resolve the sense of space in the room. It is not evident where the wall meets the floor or how the bed relates to the wall. There are no drawing lines depicting a skirting board and there are only localised indented lines that nominally mark out this junction running up to, but not behind, the Angel Gabriel, as if this were marked in later.[6] 

The search for the missing skirting board

Is this lack of 'care' actually evidence of Stephens's hand, and have art historians been mistakenly attributing it to Rossetti this whole time? If so, it's unfortunate for Stephens that his 'faults' as an artist actually indicate his work on something. This is pure speculation on my part, but I'd welcome any thoughts that others might have.

'Perspective purposes'

Actually, Stephens was no stranger to the technicalities of perspective. He had been giving the Rossetti brothers practical lessons in the subject since the summer of 1849. A letter from William Michael in June indicates that Stephens had offered a critique of some cubes which William had drawn as an exercise in correct perspectival drawing.[7] The following month, William and Gabriel called on Stephens 'for perspective purposes'.[8]

Stephens continued to act as a sort of casual art tutor for D. G. Rossetti at around this time, as he later recalled:

[W]anting to improve his knowledge of perspective, a subject of the Royal Academy curriculum to which he had never addressed himself, [Rossetti] came to me to be helped in that respect. That he was a particularly intelligent, but not very diligent learner is shown by the rough sketch of two medieval pages quarrelling. [...] Assuming the airs of a teacher, I had complained that he neglected his work. His reply was this sketch, intended to show what I should incur by continuing to grumble.[9]

The 'rough sketch' Stephens is referring to is now in the collection of Glasgow Museums (see below). The sheet is inscribed on the back in Stephens's hand: 'These sketches were made by D. G. Rossetti upon paper he used while I was teaching him perspective'.[10]

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Two pugilists and figure studies, ca. 1849, pencil on paper, 25.9 x 18.2 cm, Glasgow Museums (PR.1955.16.ao)

Rotated detail of the above sheet of sketches in the Glasgow Museums collection, showing the parallel lines and a small square drawn by Rossetti during one of Stephens's lessons

Rossetti probably drew the two quarrelling pages as caricatures of himself and Stephens. The figures are wearing medieval costumes with pointed shoes, similar to those in Millais’s painting Isabella, for which both Rossetti and Stephens had modelled in 1848–9. The quarrelling figures are superimposed over a series of parallel lines and a small square in the corner – evidence of Rossetti's impatience during the lesson, much to Stephens's frustration!

Stephens's recognised knowledge of perspective does partly explain why Rossetti asked him to help out with Ecce Ancilla Domini!.

'"Popish" sentiment'

Besides working on the perspective of Rossetti's Ecce Ancilla Domini!, Stephens made another contribution to its material construction which is small but worth noting. Earlier in 1849, while Rossetti was still planning the painting, he thought about including an archaic inscription copied from one of Stephens's brass rubbings of medieval monuments. Stephens, who had antiquarian interests, had been collecting these rubbings since the mid-1840s. Evidently, the inscription was intended to go on the picture frame.[11] However, it caused a stir with Rossetti's family: 'My people are beginning to wail and lament over the Popish inscription', he wrote to Stephens in August 1849 (before the painting was even begun).[12] By 'Popish', Rossetti presumably meant that the inscription was in Latin. A Latin text affixed to a Marian-themed painting that was made by an artist with an Italian surname would have carried connotations of monasticism and Roman Catholicism. In a largely Protestant society, such religious practises were controversial – hence Ruskin's desire to distance himself from the PRB's perceived 'monkish follies' in his reviews in 1851. The picture frame which we see today is not the original, but a later replacement designed by Rossetti, so the inscription which Stephens provided has been lost.

Source: The Frame Blog.

Recognising Stephens's role in the making of Rossetti's famed painting helps us to think differently about how the Pre-Raphaelites practised their art. We must remind ourselves that even 'geniuses' like Rossetti (Stephens himself was quick to apply this label to his friend) did not work in heroic or romantic isolation, alone in their studios. Their paintings sometimes depended on acts of fraternal cooperation: in the case of Ecce Ancilla Domini!, Stephens assisted Rossetti with an aspect of picture-making with which the latter had been struggling: drawing in perspective. These 'collaborations' were often obscured or forgotten after the painting was completed – Rossetti was still responsible for the majority of the work and it was he who signed the canvas. Nevertheless, these hidden collaborations between the young artists resulted in the pictorial innovations which we now associate with Pre-Raphaelitism.

Notes

Parts of this post are drawn from my PhD thesis.

[1] William E. Fredeman, ed., The PRB Journal: William Michael Rossetti's Diary of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood 1849–1853 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1975), p. 33.

[2] Fredeman, PRB Journal, 19 November 1849, p. 26.

[3] William Michael Rossetti, Dante Gabriel Rossetti: His Family-Letters with a Memoir (London: Ellis, 1895), vol. 1, p. 122.

[4] The entry for the painting in the Rossetti Archive: http://www.rossettiarchive.org/docs/s44.rap.html.

[5] Elizabeth Prettejohn, The Art of the Pre-Raphaelites (London: Tate, 2000), p. 51.

[6] Joyce H. Townsend, Jacqueline Ridge and Stephen Hackney, Pre-Raphaelite Painting Techniques: 1848–1856 (London: Tate, 2004), p. 102.

[7] 'Is it a fact that my cubes are erroneous in construction? I was not without vague misgivings at the time. Or are they merely slovenly in handling?'; letter from W. M. Rossetti to Stephens, 30 June 1849, in Roger W. Peattie, ed., Selected Letters of William Michael Rossetti (2003), p. 4.

[8] The same letter as in note 6: '[W]e should be with you for perspective purposes on the then Friday week.'

[9] Frederic George Stephens, Dante Gabriel Rossetti (London: Seeley and Co., 1894), p. 29.

[10] The inscription is noted in Surtees's catalogue raisonné of Rossetti's work (vol. 1, p. 220) and the online Rossetti Archive: http://www.rossettiarchive.org/docs/s669.rap.html.

[11] Leslie Parris, ed., The Pre-Raphaelites (London: Tate, 1984), p. 73; Alastair Grieve's catalogue entry for Rossetti's painting. Inscribing lines of text onto picture frames – poem quotations, bible verses, picture titles – was a common Pre-Raphaelite practice.

[12] Letter from Rossetti to Stephens, 21 August 1849, in William E. Fredeman, ed., The Correspondence of Dante Gabriel Rossetti (2002–15), vol. 1, p. 88.

The stone and the brush: Drawing from nature

This time two years ago, I arrived in Brazil for the first time. While in São Paulo I visited the Pinacoteca, which is to Brazilian art what Tate Britain is to British art – it contains many excellent examples of nineteenth-century Brazilian painting, an area of art history which is virtually unknown in the UK. I previously wrote a blog post about one of these works, Pedro Weingärtner's The maker of angels. Another picture in the Pinacoteca which caught my attention was Infância de Giotto (Giotto's childhood) by Oscar Pereira da Silva (1867–1939), painted in 1895:

Oscar Pereira da Silva, Infância de Giotto (Giotto's childhood), 1895, oil on canvas, 138 x 75 cm, Pinacoteca de São Paulo, Brazil.

The painting depicts a speculated incident from the childhood of the Florentine painter and architect Giotto di Bondone (ca. 1267–1337), one of the great artists of the early Renaissance. The account of Giotto's life given in Giorgio Vasari's Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects (1550/68) recounts the following story from when Giotto was ten years old and living in the Tuscan countryside with his father, a shepherd:

[Giotto] was constantly driven by his natural inclination to draw on the stones or the ground some object in nature, or something that came into his mind. One day Cimabue, going on business from Florence to Vespignano, found Giotto, while his sheep were feeding, drawing a sheep from nature upon a smooth and solid rock with a pointed stone, having never learnt from any one but nature. Cimabue, marvelling at him, stopped and asked him if he would go and be with him. And the boy answered that if his father were content he would gladly go. Then Cimabue asked Bondone for him, and he gave him up to him, and was content that he should take him to Florence.[1]

As ever, I was looking at this painting with my Pre-Raphaelite hat on. Giotto's work was greatly admired by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, and F. G. Stephens wrote appreciatively of his frescoes (or the reproductions that he saw of them) in his essays for The Germ and The Crayon in the 1850s. But I was also reminded of – bear with me – Dante Gabriel Rossetti's early painting The girlhood of Mary Virgin:

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, The girlhood of Mary Virgin, 1848–9, oil on canvas, 83.2 x 65.4 cm, Tate, London.

Why the connection? Look at what the young Mary (the younger woman with the red hair) is doing and what she is working on. She is seated at an embroidery frame, and has been patiently working a design of three white lilies onto the blood-red fabric. If we follow her gaze, we realise that she has been copying the three real lilies which are standing in a vase atop a stack of books in front of her. She has even mimicked the different directions in which the flower heads are facing: two pointing in one direction, the third in the opposite direction.

Mary is therefore making art in accordance with Pre-Raphaelite principles, tracing natural forms directly from original objects that exist in her reality, through close observation. F. G. Stephens stated that Pre-Raphaelite artists were aiming to produce 'pure transcripts and faithful studies from nature', and that this required 'a somewhat longer and more devoted course of observation than any other'.[2] Mary, therefore, is a Pre-Raphaelite artist. Pereira da Silva has depicted Giotto in much the same way. Instead of embroidery, it is scratching onto a rock with a stone, and instead of lilies, it is a sheep (or a goat? It looks more like a goat to me) – yet the basic idea is unchanged. Giotto was an actual pre-Raphaelite painter who is credited with being one of the first artists to draw directly from the world around him; a concept which Pereira da Silva explores by illustrating Vasari's anecdote in a highly realistic manner.

The connections between Pereira da Silva's painting and Pre-Raphaelitism don't stop here. Rossetti also admired Giotto because he is thought to have painted one of the few known likenesses of Dante Alighieri, the Florentine poet whom Rossetti idolised with a quasi-religious fervour. In 1852, Rossetti made several studies for a design of Giotto painting the portrait of Dante:

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Study for 'Giotto painting the portrait of Dante', 1852, ink on paper, 19 x 16.8 cm, Tate, London. 

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Giotto painting the portrait of Dante, ca. 1852, pen and ink on paper, Birmingham Museums Trust.

These designs[3] culminated in a finished watercolour:

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Giotto painting the portrait of Dante, 1852, watercolour on paper, 36.8 x 47 cm, collection of Andrew Lloyd Webber. Source.

Like Pereira da Silva, Rossetti was influenced by Vasari's biography of Giotto, which states that 'Giotto painted, among others, as may be seen to this day in the chapel of the Podestà's Palace at Florence, Dante Alighieri, his contemporary and great friend, and no less famous a poet than Giotto was a painter'.[4] Rossetti used this as a starting-point for his design, in which Giotto is shown painting Dante's portrait onto the chapel wall while Dante himself gazes wistfully down at Beatrice Portinari, his unrequited love (the red-haired woman in the lower-right corner). Rossetti's watercolour is all about different powers of observation: Giotto, a painter, is looking at Dante, a poet, who is looking at Beatrice. Both Giotto and Dante will immortalise the objects of their gaze in their works of art: the painted fresco, and the poems in La vita nuova.

Fresco in the Podestà Chapel in the Palazzo del Bargello, Florence, attributed to Giotto di Bondone. Dante is thought to be the central figure dressed in dark red. Source.

In a 1979 article about this supposed portrait of Dante by Giotto in the Podestà Chapel at the Bargello in Florence, the art historian E. H. Gombrich posed the question: 'Did Giotto draw a sheep on a stone, and did he make a portrait of Dante?'[5] Rossetti chose to depict Giotto in much the same way as Pereira da Silva would, forty years later: a gifted artist drawing directly from nature. Even the sense of graphic creation is similar; the pointed stone of Giotto's childhood has been replaced with the delicate brush of the professional painter, and the rock outdoors with the whitewashed chapel wall.

As in other cases, it's difficult to know if Pereira da Silva was at all aware of Pre-Raphaelitism. His style generally was inspired by French realist and Academic painting rather than the peculiarities of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood; see other examples of his work on the Google Art Project. Still, it helps us to consider how artists from different countries shared common interests in early Renaissance art and the idea of drawing directly from nature.

Notes

[1] Translation of Vasari's 'Life of Giotto' by Adrienne DeAngelis.

[2] Frederic George Stephens (pseudonym 'John Seward'), 'The Purpose and Tendency of Early Italian Art', The Germ, no. 2 (February 1850), p. 58. Rossetti Archive.

[3] Several years later, Rossetti attempted to paint a replica of this subject, which he never completed – it's now in the collection of Harvard Art Museums.

[4] See note 1.

[5] E. H. Gombrich, 'Giotto's Portrait of Dante?', The Burlington Magazine, vol. 121, no. 917 (August 1979), p. 472.

'Utterly vile as works of art': When British travellers met the 'Michelangelo of Brazil'

The name Aleijadinho is not familiar to many people outside Brazil. It's the nickname given to Antônio Francisco Lisboa (1730/38–1814), the sculptor and architect whose works are now recognised as defining examples of Brazilian baroque art and architecture. (That is, if he was even a real person – a topic of some controversy and debate. For the purposes of this post, let's assume he did exist.) Aleijadinho was a Mineiro (a person from Minas Gerais) through and through, and his works can be seen throughout Minas, including the towns of Ouro Preto,[1] São João del Rei and Congonhas do Campo. Where does the nickname come from? 'O Aleijadinho' means 'The Little Cripple', owing to an apocryphal story that the artist caught leprosy and continued to work even after his hands had deteriorated, with his tools tied to the stumps of his wrists so that he could carve his sculptures, chiselling through the pain. The honorary title of 'the Michelangelo of Brazil' has been applied over the years, although this label does feel a bit clickbaity – the two artists worked in very different times, places and visual styles.[2]

Euclásio Ventura, Antônio Francisco Lisboa (Aleijadinho), posthumous portrait, 19th century, Museu de Congonhas, Congonhas do Campo, Minas Gerais, Brazil. Source.

In my previous post I discussed the British explorer Richard Francis Burton's journey through Minas Gerais in the 1860s, accompanied by his wife Isabel – as documented in his book Explorations of the Highlands of the Brazil (1869).

In December 1867 (or possibly January 1868), the couple arrived in Congonhas do Campo, then a 'hamlet of 600 souls'. Even on their approach, Richard noted the prominence of the church and convent, the Santuário do Bom Jesus de Matosinhos, at the centre of the town: 'At first glance Congonhas appeared to be all one church and convent'.[3] When they arrived, they were shown around by the Reverend Padre Antonio José de Costa of the Brotherhood of Bom Jesus de Matosinhos. He took them to see the sculptures by Aleijadinho which can be found throughout the town's historic centre. This includes a series of seven sculpted tableaux depicting scenes from the Passion of Christ, created by Aleijadinho and his assistants in the 1790s. They consist of life-sized wooden figures of the biblical characters arranged like actors on a stage in dramatic poses (the figures are not fixed to the floor and can therefore be moved or rearranged). Each scene is enclosed within a small oratory, so visitors must walk from one building to the next in a zig-zag pattern, following the story as it unfolds up a gentle slope:

The series of domed oratories containing the individual scenes from Aleijadinho's Passion series in Congonhas. Source.

This is what Richard Burton thought of the first scene, the Last Supper, when he looked inside:

Wooden figures, mostly mere masques or 'dickies', without bowels or dorsal spine, dressed like the traditional Turk of the Christian Mediterranean type, are seated at a table richly spread with tea (or maté) pots, cups, liqueurs, and meats.

Aleijadinho, Last Supper tableau, Congonhas. Still from the documentary O Aleijadinho (1978), dir. Joaquim Pedro de Andrade. Note the presence of food and drink (presumably also carved sculptures?) on the table in Burton's description; evidently these no longer exist.

Our Lord is saying, 'One of you shall betray me.' 

Head of Christ from the Last Supper by Aleijadinho. Still from the documentary O Aleijadinho (1978), dir. Joaquim Pedro de Andrade.

All look with quaint expressions of horror and surprise, except Judas, who sits next the door, hideous of aspect, and caring as little to disguise his villainy as Iago upon an English stage. My wife complied with the custom of the place, took the knife from Judas his platter, and dug it into his eye, or rather into a deep cut which cleaves his left molar bone, and then smote with it his shoulder. This poor Judas!

Figure of Judas clutching the bag of coins from the Last Supper by Aleijadinho. Source.

After performing this strange ritual, Richard and Isabel proceeded to the oratory that presented Christ's arrest by the Roman soldiers, Judas having betrayed him:

The first of the new stations shows the mercurial and somewhat Hibernian St. Peter striking off the ear while the Saviour is about to heal the wound.

Source.

Christ (right) and Judas from the Arrest of Christ by Aleijadinho. Source.

The inscription Tanquam ad latronem, &c., does not merit notice; the Pagan soldiers do. Surely such Roman-nosed warriors never could have existed unless they used their proboscis as the elephant uses its trunk.

On the extreme left of the scene we see Peter raising his sword above his head, having just sliced off the ear of the Roman solider, Malchus, who kneels in the foreground on the far right; Christ in the centre steps forward to heal the wound.

The wounded soldier Malchus. Source.

Burton concludes of the Passion series:

But grotesque as they are, and utterly vile as works of art, these wooden caricatures, serve, I have no doubt, to fix their subjects firmly in the public mind, and to keep alive a certain kind of devotion.[4]

Curiously, Burton does not mention that these sculptures are by Aleijadinho. This doesn't mean that he didn't know about the artist; earlier in his book he mentions the 'handless man, whose labours we shall find scattered throughout this part of the Province':

He is generally known as the Aleijado or Aleijadinho – the Cripple or the Little Cripple; some call him O Ignacinho, little Ignatius, others Antonio Francisco. His work was done with tools adjusted by an assistant to the stumps that represented arms.[5]

Burton does acknowledge that the artist was responsible for the other sculptures in Congonhas, which are even more famous: the life-sized stone figures of the twelve Prophets, created between 1800 and 1805. The statues occupy the forecourt of the church of the Santuário do Bom Jesus de Matosinhos:

Source

Daniel by Aleijadinho. Photo: Brian J. McMorrow.

Isaiah by Aleijadinho. Photo: Brian J. McMorrow.

Baruch by Aleijadinho. Photo: Brian J. McMorrow.

Joel by Aleijadinho. Photo: Brian J. McMorrow.

Here's what Burton wrote about these 'twelve gigantic figures':

Each figure is inhabited in conventional Oriental costume, bearing a roll engraved with some remarkable passage from his book, in Latin and large old letters. The material is steatite [soapstone], found in the neighbourhood, and the workman was the ubiquitous Cripple [...] The group has a good effect at a distance, and in the Brazil the idea is original: it compares, however, poorly with the Bom Jesus de Braga, near Oporto, and the humblest of Italian holy palaces.[6]

These must be among the earliest written descriptions of the works of one of Brazil's greatest artists by a British traveller. It's just a shame that the traveller in question didn't think very highly of them! Burton's hyperbolic criticisms – 'utterly vile as works of art', 'grotesque', 'mere masques or "dickies"' – remind me of the extreme language that the art critics hurled at the early paintings of the Pre-Raphaelites in the 1850s; Charles Dickens's famous review in 1850, declaring that the new style of Pre-Raphaelite painting represented 'the lowest depths of what is mean, odious, repulsive, and revolting'.[7] The subject of British responses to Aleijadinho in the nineteenth century requires further research – did any other Brits visiting Brazil see these distinctive sculptures and churches, and write about them? I'm not sure if this has ever been considered before!

The extraordinary angel from the Agony in the Garden by Aleijadinho at Congonhas. Source.

Notes

[1] Aleijadinho was born in Ouro Preto in the 1730s, when the town was known by an older name, Villa Rica. He lived there his entire life and died there on 18 November 1814. He's buried in the Igreja [Church] Matriz de Nossa Senhora da Conceição de Antônio Dias, in Ouro Preto.

[2] Daniel Whittaker, 'On the golden trail of Brazil's Michelangelo', The Observer, 23 April 2000.

[3] Richard Francis Burton, Explorations of the Highlands of the Brazil (1869), vol. 1, pp. 165-66.

[4] The description of the Aleijadinho Passion series quoted here can be found in Burton, Explorations, vol. 1, pp. 168-69.

[5] Burton, Explorations, vol. 1, pp. 122-23.

[6] Burton, Explorations, vol. 1, p. 171. Burton is referring the sanctuary of Bom Jesus de Braga near the city of Braga in Portugal.

[7] Charles Dickens, 'Old Lamps for New Ones', Household Words, 15 June 1850, pp. 12-14.

'Misery and splendour': Two Victorian travellers in Juiz de Fora

This post concerns two British Victorian explorers who visited Brazil in the 1860s and 1870s – specifically the city of Juiz de Fora in the state of Minas Gerais. Why Juiz de Fora? It's somewhere I'm familiar with; it's my boyfriend Felipe's hometown, I've stayed there three times and have visited the places discussed in this post. The city doesn't feature highly on the list of tourist destinations in Brazil; it's more of a working town, with a moderate population of around 500,000 inhabitants. It's inland, so there are none of the beaches and coastal landscapes which tourists often associate with Brazil. However, it's only around three hours by coach from Rio de Janeiro, and has beautiful surroundings and an interesting history of its own.

Juiz de Fora seen from the Morro do Imperador. Own photo, 14 May 2019.

To begin, then, with Richard Francis Burton:

Frederic Leighton, Richard Francis Burton, 1872–5, oil on canvas, 61 x 51 cm, National Portrait Gallery, London.

Burton (1821–90), a British explorer, diplomat and writer (just some of his occupations; he had so many throughout his life that it's difficult to list them all), is well-known for his 'adventures' across Asia, Africa and the Americas – the sort of manly escapades you might find in a Boys' Own magazine. Burton worked in Brazil as a diplomat from 1865–8, accompanied by his wife Isabel (née Arundel; 1831–96), his 'constant companion'. After returning to England he published a lengthy account of the 'holiday excursion' which he and Isabel made 'to the Gold Mines of Minas Geraes [sic] via Petropolis, Barbaçena, and the Prairies and Highlands of the Brazil'.[1] The book records his impressions of the places he visited, and occasionally the visual culture of the Brazilian people which he encountered – not always with enthusiasm.

In June 1867, Richard and Isabel passed through Juiz de Fora, which was then a small town. Felipe and I were intrigued to see what Richard thought of it. We were in for a treat. 'The city is the usual mixture of misery and splendour' (ouch!), Burton begins, before continuing:

Juiz de Fora is a single dusty or muddy street, or rather road, across which palms are planted in pairs. [...] The dwellings are low and poor, mostly 'door and window' as the phrase is. Amongst them, however, are large and roomy town houses, with gilt pineapples on the roof, glass balls on the French balconies, fantastic water-spouts, pig-tailed corners, birds of tile and mortar disposed along the ridges, and all the architectural freaks of Rio de Janeiro.[2]

Rua Halfeld in the centre of Juiz de Fora, Brazil, in the nineteenth century. Photo: Museu Mariano Procópio Archive.

I mean, it doesn't look that bad!

Burton paid a visit to one of Juiz de Fora's notable sites: the home of the engineer and politician Mariano Procópio Ferreira Lage (1821–72), which had been built in 1856–61 in the style of an Italian villa, with a surrounding park. The villa housed Ferreira Lage's ever-growing art collection. After his death, his son Alfredo built an extension so that the artworks could be displayed to the public; this opened in 1922. The collection comprises works by nineteenth-century Brazilian painters and sculptors, with some pictures from Europe, including a notable landscape painting by the Dutch Willem Roelofs (about which Felipe wrote his MA dissertation). Today, the complex is known as the Museu Mariano Procópio, and its beautiful grounds are open to the public. The museum and villa are in a less happy state: the former is able to display only a handful of works from the collection (just sculptures – no paintings), while the latter is shut up indefinitely for repairs. It's only a few minutes' walk from Felipe's family home, so I know it well enough by now!

Aerial photo of the Museu Mariano Procópio, the original villa at the top and the 1922 extension below it. Photo: Pinterest; couldn't find the original source!

The original Villa Ferreira Lage built in 1856–61, as it appears today. Source.

Richard Burton described the villa as the 'château' of Juiz de Fora, and this is what it looked like when he saw it in the 1860s:

The villa of Mariano Procópio, Juiz de Fora (probably 1860s). Photo: Museu Maranio Procópio Archive.

Today, the villa is obscured by trees, so it can no longer be seen from the road. Perhaps surprisingly, Burton was not impressed by what he saw, writing fussily:

Our fastidious English taste could find no fault in house or grounds, except that they were a little fantastic, the contrast with Nature was somewhat too violent – an Italian villa-garden in a virgin forest is startling. The château, which cost 30,000l. [pounds] or 40,000l., has too much colour and too many medallions; behind it, too, there is an ugly bridge leading to a prim summer-house, both of cast iron, and the former painfully like a viaduct.[3]

The offending bridge and summer house still stand:

An 'ugly' bridge? Source.

In some ways it's unsurprising to see a Victorian gentleman using his 'fastidious English taste' as an excuse to be condescending towards another country's culture. For me, the very incongruity and unexpectedness of the Villa Ferreira Lage are what make it so interesting: it's a nineteenth-century Brazilian interpretation of historical Italian architecture planted in the midst of a small tropical forest, which is itself a manmade construction. It looms suddenly into view as you ascend the mound on which it stands, a dream of Venice through the trees and spider webs. It reminds me of Appleyard College, the fictional girls' school in Joan Lindsay's novel Picnic at Hanging Rock (1967), a villa of European design awkwardly placed in the hazy Australian outback, a metaphor for the story's imperialist themes.[4]

Burton was equally unimpressed by the extensive grounds of Ferreira Lage's grand home:

The little lake, with bamboo-tufted islets, dwarf Chinese bridges, and paddled boat, worked by negroes instead of steam; the 'Grotto of the Princesses', the grotesque seats and arbours, and the rustic figures of wood, are a trifle too artificial, and the Ema and stags, not pacing over the park, but caged along with monkeys and silver pheasants, suggested a menagerie. The European and tropical plants, however, were magnificent, and we measured an arum-leaf 5 feet 4 inches long. [...] We wandered about the orangery, which was innocent of glass, and found out the favourite trees; we lay for hours upon the grass eating the Tangerines, enjoying the perfumed shade of the myrtles, and admiring the young Wellingtonias and screwpines.[5]

The Parque Museu Maranio Procópio, Juiz de Fora. Source.

Photo by y.naomi, Flickr.

The bamboos have grown magnificently since Burton saw them!

It was a bit rich of Burton to criticise the park's 'artificial' features on account of 'English taste', given the vogue among eighteenth-century English aristocrats for ferociously reshaping the grounds of their country houses to the point where manmade lakes and fake grottoes, temples, ruins and hermitages (sometimes complete with a live-in hermit!) became a cultural norm (a trend partly influenced by the paintings of Claude Lorrain). The 'Grotto of the Princess', which is still in the park in Juiz de Fora today (see below), wouldn't look out of place in the grounds of Blenheim Palace!

Photo by Sylvio Bazote, Flickr.

After Richard Burton left the city, he was followed a few years later by Marianne North (1830–90), the famed botanist and artist. Although North didn't make any of her paintings there (that we know of!), she did write about her visit to the town in her memoirs, posthumously published in 1894.

Julia Margaret Cameron, Marianne North, 1877, albumen print, V&A, London.

North was a born traveller. She accompanied her father Frederick on excursions to Switzerland, Syria and the Nile in the 1850s and 1860s. When Frederick died in 1869, Marianne determined to continue travelling, but to go even farther abroad – and to do so alone, which, needless to say, was highly unusual for a Victorian woman (although her upper-class status undoubtedly made things easier). A keen botanist and painter, she intended to document the flora and landscapes of the countries she visited in small, detailed oil paintings, around 1,000 of which now survive in the extraordinary Marianne North Gallery at Kew Gardens.

Marianne North, Flowers of cassia corymbosa in Minas Geraes, Brazil, ca. 1873, oil on board, 45 x 35 cm, Marianne North Gallery, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Richmond, UK.

Marianne North, Study of traveller's tree of Madagascar in the Botanic Garden of Rio de Janeiro, ca. 1873, oil on board, 35 x 43 cm, Marianne North Gallery, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Richmond, UK. The prominent hill in the background is where the famous Christ the Redeemer statue (1922–31) now stands.

Brazil was one of the first countries North visited by herself. She arrived in the northeastern state of Pernambuco in August 1872, and spent about a year in the country before departing for England in September 1873. She passed through Juiz de Fora in late October or early November 1872, on her way to São João del Rei, a colonial town in Minas. Her reaction to Juiz de Fora was kinder than Burton's:

[The town] is all one monument to the great and good man who founded it, Senhor Mariano Lages [sic]; even the excellent hotel was designed and built by him, and a college for agriculture, library, museum, his own pretty villa and gardens, and the grand road itself, were all made by him for the good of his country, as well as his own. [...] The village itself looked very comfortable, every cottage having its own luxuriant little garden and shady porch, under which the fair German women and children sat knitting with their hair plaited around their heads.[6]

Ferreira Lage had died earlier that year, in February 1872. North greatly admired the aforementioned park surrounding the villa, saying that it was 'full of treasures',

not only of plants, but of birds and animals; there was a fence of fifty yards at least, entirely hung with rare orchids tied together; every available tree-branch was also decorated in the same way, and many of them were covered when we were there with lovely blossoms of white, lilac, and yellow, mostly very sweet-scented. There was also a great variety of palms. I saw one huge candelabra cactus twenty feet in height, and the air was perfumed with orange and lemon blossoms.[7]

Common to both North's and Burton's accounts is the wonder with which they viewed the trees, flowers and wildlife in Ferreira Lage's park, so different to what they knew back home. The park was a place to be quiet and restful in, to wonder at the natural world. In the Marianne North Gallery there is a large study of a Brazilian columnar cactus which could have been inspired by the 'huge candelabra cactus' which North saw in the park, although this is pure conjecture:

Marianne North, A Brazilian columnar cactus, ca. 1880, oil on canvas, 111 x 76 cm, Marianne North Gallery, UK.

In my next post, I will continue to examine the presence of these Victorian travellers in Minas Gerais.

Endnote: the present day

Me in the Parque Mariano Procópio, Juiz de Fora, 12 May 2019.

Bronze allegorical sculpture of 'The Arts' in the Parque Mariano Procópio, 17 May 2018.

Cabinet of plaster casts in the Museu Mariano Procópio, 17 May 2018.

Notes

[1] Richard Francis Burton, Explorations of the Highlands of the Brazil (London: Tinsley Brothers, 1869), vol. 1, p. 20.

[2] Burton, Explorations, vol. 1, p. 50.

[3] Burton, Explorations, vol. 1, p. 51.

[4] For his 1975 film adaptation of Picnic at Hanging Rock, Peter Weir chose the real Martindale Hall in south Australia as the location for the school, which has echoes of the Villa Ferreira Lage.

[5] Burton, Explorations, vol. 1, pp. 51–52.

[6] Marianne North, Recollections of a Happy Life, edited by Mrs John Addington Symonds (London: Macmillan and Co., 1894), vol. 1, pp. 129–30.

[7] North, Recollections, vol. 1, p. 130.

Remembering F. G. Stephens

Rebecca Clara Dalton Stephens and Frederic George Stephens, 1890s, by an unknown photographer. Image courtesy of the Colonel Stephens Railway Museum, Kent.

Frederic George Stephens, the Pre-Raphaelite artist, art critic, art historian, and sometime poet and model, died on this day in 1907, aged 79.[1] In this post I will tell you some lesser-known things about his life and work, which I discovered while researching my PhD thesis on him.

Alphonse Legros, F. G. Stephens, 1889, silverpoint, location unknown, published in J. B. Manson, Frederick [sic] George Stephens and the Pre-Raphaelite Brothers (1920). Stephens and Legros were close friends, and the former wrote reviews of the artist's work.

Stephens photographed by Frederick Hollyer, ca. 1890, published in Hollyer's Portraits of Many Persons of Note, Victoria & Albert Museum, London.

A day on the water

One of Stephens's favourite pastimes, when he wasn't painting, reading, writing or visiting museums and country houses, was rowing. He rowed all his life. I don't know exactly when he first took up this hobby, but it comes up a lot in his early correspondence (late teens, early 20s), inviting his Pre-Raphaelite friends – William Michael Rossetti, the Tupper brothers, Holman Hunt, Rossetti – for leisurely jaunts down the Thames. Sometimes they'd accept, other times gracefully decline. In one letter (I can't now find the exact date) he mentioned having fallen out of the boat into the water during one of these merry excursions – given the state of the river water in those days, lord knows what that felt like!

Why rowing? My theory is that, because of Stephens's lame leg,[2] it was an outdoor physical pursuit which didn't require him to use his legs as much – rowing is more of an upper-body activity. He also evidently found the practice of rowing immensely relaxing, and being out on the water gave him time and space to think, away from the relatively cramped home which he shared with his family. He wrote at least two prose pieces influenced by his rowing habits: 'A Night on the Water', published in an obscure journal called Titan in 1859; and its sequel 'A Day on the Water', which appeared in Macmillan's Magazine in 1864. They are strange things that are hard to categorise: part historical essay, part moody prose poem. Stephens describes the historical locations and heritage sites seen along the banks of the Thames from the rowboat, but also the natural sights around him: 'The day is fresh and brisk with a constant air [...] It is river and sky, sky and river, white cloudlets like swans among the grey'.[3] I need to look into them more!

In 1866, after Stephens married Rebecca Clara Dalton, the couple took up a lease on 10 Hammersmith Terrace, the garden of which backs into the Thames:

View of Hammersmith Terrace from the River Thames. Source.

One of the main reasons why Stephens was attracted to the house was because it allowed easy access to the water. He had his own rowboat which he kept moored at the end of the garden; in one or two letters he mentions having to get it repainted. This stretch of the Thames is also a prime spot for viewing the annual Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race – an event which Stephens followed with interest (the first race was in 1829). He would invite friends and relatives to come around and watch the race from the upper windows of the house, which gave an unrestricted view of the river. One vivid letter by Clara Stephens to her husband not long after their marriage gives an account of her running the household during the boat race while he was away on research, and a stream of visitors arriving to watch the boats from the bedrooms.

'A very prepossessing head'

It's no secret that Stephens was a favourite male model of the PRB. William Michael Rossetti wrote to his mother Frances in September 1849: 'Stephens has, as you say, a most pensive and, I think, very prepossessing head. Millais is painting him for Ferdinand listening to Ariel'.[4] What's telling here is the phrase 'as you say', suggesting that Frances Rossetti too found Stephens good-looking; his physical attractiveness was recognised by both men and women (neither of whom, in this case, were professional artists, and one of whom wasn't even a member of the Brotherhood). Millais's Ferdinand is a faithful likeness of Stephens, when compared with a photograph of him taken in 1859:

John Everett Millais, Ferdinand lured by Ariel, 1849-50, oil on canvas, 65 x 51 cm, The Makins Collection, USA. Source.

F. G. Stephens photographed by Joseph Cundall, 1859, published in Jeremy Maas, The Victorian Art World in Photographs (1984)

Stephens also sat for the central figure of Christ in Madox Brown's Jesus washing Peter's feet:

Ford Madox Brown, Jesus washing Peter's feet, 1852-6, oil on canvas, 116.8 x 133.3 cm, Tate, London. Source.

Ford Madox Brown, Study of F. G. Stephens for 'Jesus washing Peter's feet', 1852, pencil on paper, 29.2 x 34.3 cm, Tate, London. Source.

Curiously, according to Holman Hunt, Brown painted Elizabeth Siddall's hair onto Stephens's head in the final painting!

But these appearances by Stephens in some of the most iconic Pre-Raphaelite paintings are all familiar by now. During my research I looked for any studies or likenesses of Stephens which have been overlooked. It is known that Stephens appears as one of the snobbish, murderous brothers sitting at the dinner table in Millais's Isabella of 1848-9:

John Everett Millais, Isabella, 1848-9, oil on canvas, 103 x 142.8 cm, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool. Source.

The smiling figure beside Stephens with light-brown hair is usually thought to be Walter Howell Deverell

Stephens is shown holding up a wineglass and chewing his fingernails. Thanks to Millais's meticulous, semi-photographic painting techniques, we can be sure that we are looking at a realistic representation of Stephens's delicate hands and handsome profile (Stephens himself later wrote that the PRBs painted their human models 'exactly, and so to say, to a hair').[5]

I found a study for this painting now in Birmingham Museums & Art Gallery which shows yet another likeness of Stephens:

John Everett Millais, Studies for 'Isabella', ca. 1848-9, pencil on paper, 25.1 x 35.4 cm, Birmingham Museums & Art Gallery. Source.

This study shows that Millais added the fabulous medieval hat later on; he initially sketched Stephens simply, in profile. About a year later, Millais would use Stephens as a model again for Ferdinand.

We don't often allow ourselves to acknowledge that the male models in early Pre-Raphaelite paintings are handsome or even beautiful – we have typically reserved those perceptions for the women, like Siddall, Anne Miller and Fanny Cornforth. Stephens is a useful starting point for considering these issues, which I would like to consider in greater detail in my future research.

'This morning we got to Louvain and tomorrow to Brussels'

Stephens's art history books aren't read much (if at all) nowadays; indeed, you'd be forgiven for forgetting that he was an art historian. But art history was as important to him as his criticism, which engaged with modern art and exhibitions rather than the art of the past. He was a self-taught historian, having not had the Oxbridge education of someone like John Ruskin, and he was equally as interested in researching art as making it while he was a student at the Royal Academy (which had an excellent library). In the 1860s Stephens was finally able to travel to other European cities in order to immerse himself in the original works of art and architecture which he had previously only seen as engravings in books.

A notable example is the trip he made to Belgium while researching his book Flemish Relics in the spring of 1865:

Front cover of Flemish Relics by F. G. Stephens, 1866. Source: Internet Archive.

He was accompanied by the photographer Joseph Fleming, who was enlisted to take photographs of the major public buildings in Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp which would be included in the book (luxuriously, as actual photographic prints stuck onto the pages). In May 1865 Stephens wrote to his stepmother Dorothy from the Hôtel le Panier d'Or in Bruges, the first stage of his journey: '[we] found this inn which is in the market-place, right opposite the famous Belfry of nearly 300 feet in height, we have seen several of the places it is necessary to see and shall see the first tomorrow'.[6]

A few days later he and Fleming were in Mechelen, having already passed through Ghent, Oudenaarde and Antwerp; 'this morning we got to Louvain [Leuven] and tomorrow to Brussels, after that it is uncertain where we shall be'. In the same letter he wrote appreciatively about the bells of St Rumbold's Cathedral in Mechelen: 'The carillions [sic] here, and at Audenaerde, are charming, those of this place are playing now some long piece like a waltz tune and very intricate of performance'.[7]

View of Mechlin Cathedral by Joseph Fleming, taken in May 1865, in F. G. Stephens's Flemish Relics.

Stephens's fascination with medieval architecture meant that he opposed what he felt was the over-restoration of historic buildings, particularly churches and cathedrals, in Victorian Britain. He wrote ferociously against the subject in his weekly columns in The Athenaeum – so much so that William Morris wrote to him in March 1877: 'there are many thoughtful people who would be glad to sacrifice time, money, and comfort in defence of those ancient monuments'. Morris had plans for establishing a society 'to keep a watch on old monuments, to protest against all "restoration" that means more than keeping out wind and weather', and he asked for Stephens's help in getting the project off the ground: 'I am unskilled in organising this sort of thing; is it too much to ask you to do something to help, and when could I see you about it?'[8] This led to the founding of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings ('Anti-Scrape') later that year. Stephens's role in the establishment of the society has not been properly acknowledged before, although of course he was not the only person involved.

Funeral

Me standing beside the grave of F. G. Stephens, 3 January 2020. Photo by Felipe Corrêa.

In January I paid a visit to Brompton Cemetery in London, where Stephens and five members of his family are buried. These others are: his father, Septimus Stephens; his stepmother, Dorothy Mary Stephens (née Farmer); his sister, Eliza Stephens; his wife, Rebecca Clara Stephens (née Dalton); and his son, Lt Col Holman Fred Stephens, the last to be buried in this plot.

Stephens's funeral took place on 14 March 1907. It was reported in the Illustrated London News on 23 March:

As the article notes, at his death Stephens was one of the last surviving members of the PRB, the others being W. M. Rossetti and Holman Hunt (from whom Stephens had long been estranged following a string of increasingly unpleasant disagreements). Stephens's youthful association with the Brotherhood determined the course of the rest of his life, having a lasting influence on how he created, researched and wrote about art. There's a wonderful quote from a letter to W. M. Rossetti which I always like to use. It was in 1899, only a few years before his death: 'By the inner principles of P[re]-R[aphaelit]ism my life has been & is still guided'.[9] Although Stephens and his work fell into relative obscurity after his death – at least when compared with his more famous Pre-Raphaelite friends, Millais, Hunt, Rossetti and co. – it was the aim of my PhD and resulting publications (the first of many, I hope!) to turn this around. I close with this memorial from the only 'book' (of sorts) to have ever been published about him, exactly 100 years ago:

My completed PhD thesis!

Notes

[1] Stephens was born on 10 October 1827; some sources give 1828, but they are contradicted by Stephens's baptism record, which gives 1827 as his birth year.

[2] In 1837, while still a child, Stephens suffered an accident which left him with a lifelong limp. The circumstances of this accident are not known. Writing to Madox Brown in 1889, he mentioned having recently hurt his foot, 'badly in the old wound of my boyhood which lamed me for life' (letter from Stephens to Brown, 16 February 1889, National Art Library, V&A).

[3] Frederic George Stephens, 'A Day on the Water', Macmillan's Magazine (1867), p. 227.

[4] Letter from W. M. Rossetti to Frances Rossetti, 28 September 1849, in Roger W. Peattie, Selected Letters of William Michael Rossetti (1990), p. 9.

[5] Frederic George Stephens, Dante Gabriel Rossetti (London: Seeley and Co., 1894), p. 17.

[6] Letter from Stephens to his stepmother Dorothy Mary Stephens, 23 May 1865, Colonel Stephens Railway Museum, Tenterden, Kent.

[7] Letter from Stephens to his stepmother Dorothy Mary Stephens, 29 May 1865, Colonel Stephens Railway Museum, Tenterden, Kent.

[8] See Norman Kelvin, ed., The Collected Letters of William Morris (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), vol. 1, pp. 351-52 and p. 356, for Morris's letters to Stephens.

[9] 3 August 1899, University of British Columbia Library, Rare Books and Special Collections Division, Angeli-Dennis Collection.