Artist Statement
The Pre-Raphaelites 1848
The Pre-Raphaelites were a group of English painters, poets, and critics, founded in 1848 by John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and William Holman Hunt.
The groups intention was to reform art by rejecting what they considered to be the mechanistic approach first adobted by the Mannerist artists who succeeded Raphael and Michelangelo. They believed that the classical poses and elegant compositions of Raphael in particular had been a corrupting influence on the academic teaching of art particularly that of statutes and the study of nature.. Hence the name "Pre-Raphaelite". Specifically, they objected to the influence of Sir Joshua Reynolds, the founder of the English Royal Academy of Arts. They called him "Sir Sloshua", believing that his broad technique was a sloppy and formulaic form of academic mannerism. In contrast, they wanted to return to the abundant detail, intense colours, and complex compositions of Quattrocentro italian and Flemish art.
The Pre-Raphaelites have been considered the first avant-garde movement in art, though they have also been denied the status, because they continued to accept both concepts of history painting and of mimeses, or imitation of nature, as central to the purpose of art. However, the Pre-Raphaelites undoubtedly defined themselves as a reformed movement, created a distinct name for their form of art, and published the periodical "The Gem".
-The group pobulared a theatrically romantic style, marked by great beauty, an intricate realism, and a foundness for Athurian And Greek Legend, such as Shakespear, Tennyson and great legends such as ophelia. The were pictorial story tellers.