Image: Beata Beatrix by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1862). Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery.
The Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne has opened 'Pre-Raphaelites: Art and Poetry', which it presents as the first large-scale exhibition to explore the connections between Pre-Raphaelite art and poetry. More than 100 paintings, drawings and objects are on view, some of which, according to the gallery, have never been shown in Newcastle before. Julie Milne, Chief Curator of Art Galleries, describes the project as bringing together key works from collections across the UK for the first time.
The exhibition follows the literary sources that shaped the movement, from Dante Alighieri and Geoffrey Chaucer to Alfred Tennyson and the Romantic poet John Keats, whose work the young Pre-Raphaelites admired, as well as writers from their own circle such as Christina Rossetti. An introductory section on the place of poetry in Pre-Raphaelitism leads into three themes: Poems Past, Romantic Rhymes and Victorian Visions.
Alongside William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Edward Burne-Jones and William Morris, the selection gives particular weight to women artists and designers, among them Elizabeth Siddall, Kate Bunce, Julia Margaret Cameron, Fanny Bunn and Phoebe Anna Traquair. Bunce is represented by a picture interpreting a poem by Rossetti.
Two paintings from the Laing's own collection sit at the centre of the show: Hunt's 'Isabella and the Pot of Basil' (1867), displayed with preparatory studies lent by the Ashmolean Museum, and Burne-Jones's 'Laus Veneris' (1873–78), presented with three preparatory studies and a related medieval manuscript. Loans include Millais's 'The Woodman's Daughter' (1851) from Guildhall Art Gallery, Rossetti's 'Beata Beatrix' from Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery, and the Morris & Co. tapestry 'The Forest' (1887) from the V&A, which incorporates a poem by Morris.
The displays extend well beyond painting, with embroidery, metalwork, stained glass, tapestry, illuminated manuscripts, books and works on paper. Other lenders include Tate, the Fitzwilliam Museum, The Higgins Bedford, the Society of Antiquaries of London, Tullie House, the William Morris Gallery and the Bodleian. The loans are supported by the Weston Loan Programme with Art Fund, and the gallery is publishing an accompanying catalogue with support from the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art.
A series of lunchtime talks accompanies the exhibition, covering the two Newcastle paintings, William Morris and the poetic interior, and, with Professor Serena Trowbridge, the theme 'Art, Poetry and the Space in Between'. The exhibition continues until 13 February 2027.
