早期的生活

爱德华琼斯Coley Burne(连字符后来)出生在伯明翰威尔士人的儿子,frame-maker爱德华·理查德·琼斯斑尼特希尔,一个蓝色的斑块纪念画家的童年。他母亲伊丽莎白琼斯Coley死在他出生六天之内,和他提出的悲伤的父亲和家庭管家,安·桑普森痴迷地深情但一本正经的和unintellectual本地女孩。 他参加了伯明翰的国王爱德华六世语法学校从1844年开始和伯明翰艺术学院从1848年到1852年,在学习之前神学在埃克塞特大学,牛津大学. 在牛津大学的他成为了朋友威廉•莫里斯由于共同对诗歌的兴趣。埃克塞特的两个本科生,加上一小群来自伯明翰称为琼斯的朋友伯明翰集, 迅速形成了一个非常接近和亲密的社会,他们称之为“兄弟会”。兄弟会的成员阅读约翰拉斯金和坦尼森,参观教堂和崇拜中世纪。伯恩-琼斯这个时候发现托马斯Malory的勒莫提d 'Arthur这是如此有影响力的在他的生活中。当时伯恩-琼斯和莫里斯都不知道罗赛蒂本人,但两人都受到他的作品,见到他通过招募他作为一个贡献者牛津和剑桥杂志,成立于1856年的莫里斯,促进他们的想法。 

伯恩-琼斯本来打算成为一个教堂牧师,但在罗赛蒂的影响他和莫里斯决定成为艺术家,和伯恩-琼斯离开大学之前一定程度上追求的艺术生涯。1857年2月,罗赛蒂写道威廉·贝尔斯科特

两个年轻人,投影仪牛津和剑桥的杂志,从牛津大学最近来镇,现在我非常亲密的朋友。他们的名字是莫里斯和琼斯。他们把艺术家而不是其他任何职业的大学一般领导,和都是男人真正的天才。琼斯的完成和富有想象力的细节设计是奇迹,任何东西除非也许不能比拟的阿尔伯特•杜勒最好的作品。 

婚姻和家庭

伯恩-琼斯1856年订婚乔治亚娜“乔吉”麦克唐纳(1840 - 1920),一个的麦克唐纳姐妹。她被训练成为一个画家,伯恩-琼斯的老同学的妹妹。他们在1860年结婚,之后她做她自己的工作木刻版画并成为亲密的朋友乔治·艾略特。麦克唐纳(另一个妹妹嫁给了艺术家先生爱德华·波因特,进一步的妹妹嫁给了铁工厂厂长阿尔弗雷德·鲍德温总理的母亲斯坦利·鲍德温和另一个妹妹的母亲拉迪亚德·吉卜林。吉卜林和鲍德温因此伯恩-琼斯的侄子结婚)。

乔治亚娜生了一个儿子,菲利普在1861年,。生了第二个儿子,出生在1864年的冬天,而乔治亚娜与猩红热重病,出生后不久就死了。家庭很快搬到41肯辛顿广场,他们的女儿玛格丽特出生在1866年。 1867年伯恩-琼斯和他的家人定居在田庄,18世纪的房子在一个大花园北,富勒姆,伦敦。1870年代的大部分时间里伯恩-琼斯不表现出一连串强烈敌意攻击后,和一个充满激情的事情(称为“一生的情感高潮”与他的希腊模型玛丽亚Zambaco结束与她试图提交自杀把自己摄政运河. 在这些艰难的岁月乔治亚娜发达与莫里斯亲密的友谊,他的妻子简爱上了罗赛蒂。莫里斯和乔吉可能爱过,但是如果他要求她离开她的丈夫,她拒绝了。最后,伯恩-琼斯仍然在一起,莫里斯一样,但莫里斯和乔治亚娜是亲密的他们的生活。 

1880年,伯恩-琼斯前景的房子在Rottingdean附近的布赖顿在苏塞克斯,作为他们的度假屋,和隔壁后不久奥布里的小屋创建北边的房子富勒姆的家中,反映出事实是在北边的道路。(几年后,1923年,罗德里克先生琼斯的负责人路透,和他的妻子,剧作家和小说家伊妮德巴格诺尔德添加邻哥特式的房子的属性,成为她的灵感和设置粉笔花园).

他陷入困境的儿子菲利普,他成为一个成功的肖像画家,死于1926年。他崇拜的女儿玛格丽特(1953年去世)结婚约翰威廉Mackail(1850 - 1945),朋友和莫里斯的传记作者,诗歌在牛津大学教授从1911 - 1916。他们的孩子是小说家安吉拉Thirkell和丹尼斯Mackail。版的男孩的杂志,朋友(No.227卷。V,1897年1月13日),在伯恩-琼斯的一篇文章称,“....他的宠物孙子用来处罚被送到站在一个角落里,他的脸在墙上。有一天在发送他很高兴找到墙上漂亮地装饰着仙女,花,鸟和兔子。他祖父宠他,利用他的天赋来缓解他最喜欢单调的忏悔。”

艺术生涯

早期:罗赛蒂和莫里斯

伯恩-琼斯一旦离开牛津后承认,他“发现自己原来他应该一直在15”。他作为一个制图员没有正规的培训,而且缺乏科学的信心。但他非凡的发明作为一个设计师已经成熟,他的头脑,丰富的知识的古典和中世纪的浪漫故事,盛产绘画主题,和他自己完成由坚定的劳动力的技能,见证了无数的图纸。第一期的作品都或多或少带着罗赛蒂的影响;但是他们已经分化从老主人的风格更灵巧的虽然不那么强烈的感觉精化富有想象力的细节。许多人钢笔画插图牛皮纸精确完成,其中他的苍白的形象(1856)是最早和最好的例子之一。虽然主题,媒介和方式源于罗塞蒂的灵感,它不是仅仅一个学生的手,但潜在的主人。这是被罗赛蒂自己,他不久声明他没有教他。 

伯恩-琼斯的第一个素描在油画始于这一年,1856年,在1857年他了Bradfield大学第一个是什么是一个巨大的系列漫画的彩色玻璃。在1858年他和院长装饰内阁的故事杰弗里·乔叟的坎特伯雷故事集,这是他第一次直接说明诗人的作品他尤其喜欢和启发他无尽的主题。因此早期,因此,我们看到艺术家忙碌在各种领域中他是劳动力。 

1857年秋伯恩-琼斯加入了莫里斯,情人节Prinsep,jr斯宾塞印刷机和其他Rossetti命运多舛的计划装修的墙壁牛津联盟。没有一个画家已经掌握了这门技术壁画,他们的照片从墙上开始剥前完成。1859年伯恩-琼斯首次意大利之旅。他看见弗洛伦斯,比萨,锡耶纳,威尼斯和其他地方,似乎找到了温柔和浪漫锡耶纳的比其他学校更有吸引力。罗赛蒂的影响仍在持续,是可见的,也许比以往任何时候都更强烈,在两个水彩画1860年,Sidonia·冯·博克和克拉拉·冯·博克。 两幅画都说明了1849年哥特小说Sidonia的女巫夫人王尔德,Sidonia·冯·博克的翻译:死Klosterhexe由约翰·威廉Meinhold(1847)。 

装饰艺术:莫里斯& Co。

主要文章:莫里斯

1861年,威廉·莫里斯成立了装饰艺术莫里斯公司,马歇尔,福克纳与罗赛蒂& co .,伯恩-琼斯,福特Madox布朗和菲利普·韦伯作为合作伙伴,一起查尔斯·福克纳和彼得保罗•马歇尔其中,前者是牛津大学兄弟会的一员,而后者布朗和罗赛蒂的朋友。 招股说明书规定,公司将进行雕刻,彩色玻璃、金属加工、paper-hangings印花棉布(印花面料),地毯. 教堂的装饰从第一个业务的一个重要组成部分。公司在显示的工作1862年国际展览吸引了很多注意,几年之内是繁荣的。两个重要世俗委员会帮助建立公司的声誉在1860年代末:皇家项目圣詹姆斯宫和“绿色餐厅”(现在的南肯辛顿博物馆维多利亚与艾伯特1867年)以彩色玻璃窗和伯恩-琼斯的面板数据。 

1871年莫里斯& co .负责windows所有的圣徒伯恩-琼斯设计的阿尔弗雷德·鲍德温,他的妻子的姐夫。该公司于1875年重组为莫里斯& co .),和伯恩-琼斯继续贡献设计的彩色玻璃,后来挂毯,直到职业生涯的结束。彩色玻璃窗基督教堂教堂和其他的建筑牛津大学被伯恩-琼斯,威廉·莫里斯& co .)的设计吗 Stanmore大厅装修是最后一个主要委员会执行的莫里斯莫里斯& co .)在1896年去世。它也是最广泛的委员会由公司,包括一系列的挂毯基于的故事圣杯伯恩-琼斯的餐厅,与数据。 

琼斯在1891年当选的一员艺术工作者协会.

说明工作

尽管已知主要作为一个画家,伯恩-琼斯也是一个插画家,帮助拉菲尔前派的美学进入主流意识。此外,他设计的书Kelmscott新闻在1892年和1898年之间。他的插图出现在下列书籍等: 

• 仙女的家庭,阿奇博尔德Maclaren(1857)
• 的人间天堂威廉•莫里斯(未完成)
• 杰弗里·乔叟的作品杰弗里·乔叟(1896)
• 画廊的圣经新西兰(1881)

绘画

伯恩-琼斯1864年当选的助理社会的水彩画家(也称为老水彩画的社会),展出,在其他工作,仁慈的骑士第一张图片,充分显示他的成熟人格作为一个艺术家。接下来的六年里的一系列精美的水彩画在同一画廊。 1866年Cassavetti委托伯恩-琼斯夫人油漆她的女儿,玛丽亚Zambaco,丘比特发现心灵,介绍导致了他们的悲剧事件。1870年,伯恩-琼斯辞去会员争议后他的画菲利斯和Demophoon。玛丽亚的特点几乎覆盖Zambaco显然是易于辨认的菲利斯(就像他们在伯恩-琼斯的一些最好的作品),和除去覆盖物下体Demophoon加上女性性自信冒犯的建议维多利亚时代敏感性。伯恩-琼斯被要求做一个轻微的改变,而是“退出不仅从墙上的图片,但自己从社会。” 

在接下来的七年,1870 - 1877,只有两个画家的作品展出。这些是两个水彩画,在达德利画廊1873年,其中一个被废墟中美丽的爱情,二十年后被摧毁的清洁应该是一幅油画,但是后来在油复制画家。然而,这种沉默的时期是一个不懈的生产。迄今为止伯恩-琼斯曾几乎完全在水彩画。他现在开始在油,许多大型图片在他们轮流工作,总是几手。第一个布瑞尔·罗丝系列,刘Veneris,金色的楼梯,皮格马利翁系列,金星的镜子是计划和完成工作,对完成或者携带远,这些年。 这些年来也标志着开始与艺术摄影师伯恩-琼斯的伙伴关系弗雷德里克·霍利,他的绘画作品的复制品and-especially-drawings将使更广泛的受众在未来几十年里伯恩-琼斯的作品。 

最后,在1877年5月,识别的日子来了,开放的第一个展览格罗夫纳画廊创造的天,梅林的迷人,和金星的镜子都显示。伯恩-琼斯跟进这些照片的信号成功与刘Veneris,吟唱似幻,锅和心灵,和其他的作品,在1878年展出。这些照片是画的颜色。变化是明显的第二年,1879年,在报喜和四个图片的第二个系列皮格马利翁和形象;前的一个最简单、最完美的艺术家的作品,是温和和清醒;在后一种柔软精致色调的方案尝试,而不是成功。类似的颜色标志的节制金色的楼梯,在1880年首次展出。几乎的幸运之轮是显示在1883年,随后于1884年国王科菲和乞丐女仆,伯恩-琼斯的一次纵容他的爱华丽的色彩,优雅的自我克制。他下了两组重要的图片,布瑞尔·罗丝和珀尔修斯的故事,虽然这些没有完成多年。 

伯恩-琼斯当选的助理皇家艺术学院1885年,次年他表现出学院(唯一一次),展示了海洋深处,一幅画的美人鱼携带了她青春的冲动她无意识地淹没在她的爱。这张照片增加了习惯性的魅力的悲剧性讽刺概念和执行的幸福给它一个地方除了伯恩-琼斯的作品之一。他在1893年正式辞去了为准会员。珀尔修斯系列之一是在1887年,两个1888年,厚颜无耻的塔,灵感来自相同的传奇。在1890年的第二个系列布瑞尔·罗丝的传说表现出自己,赢得了广泛的赞赏。巨大的水彩,伯利恒之星,画公司的伯明翰,于1891年展出。长期生病一段时间检查了画家的活动,,恢复时,要忙于装饰方案。一个展览他的作品举行新画廊在1892 - 1893年的冬天。属于这一时期他的几个肖像的较少。伯恩-琼斯在1894年做了一个从男爵健康不佳再次打断了他的作品的进步,其中最主要的是巨大的亚瑟在阿瓦隆。在冬天他死后的第二个展览他的作品举行新画廊,和他的一个展览图纸(包括一些迷人的幽默的草图为儿童)的伯灵顿美术俱乐部. 

设计的剧院

1894年,影院经理和演员亨利·欧文伯恩-琼斯的舞台布景与服装设计演讲厅剧院生产的亚瑟王j . Comyns卡尔,伯恩-琼斯的守护和导演的新画廊以及一个剧作家。该剧主演亚瑟王和欧文艾伦特里作为漂亮宝贝伦敦,参观了美国后运行。 伯恩-琼斯接受委员会enthuisiasm,但很失望的最终结果。他秘密地向他的朋友海伦玛丽加斯克尔(可能),“甲是他们不厌其烦地用它…珀西瓦尔看着一个浪漫的事情…我讨厌舞台,不讲我做的。” 

美学

伯恩-琼斯的画作是一个进化的tapestry的链唯美主义从1860年代到1880年代,认为艺术应该重视作为美的对象产生的反应,而不是故事或道德隐含的主题。在许多方面,这是与拉斯金和早期的理想背道而驰的拉斐尔前派艺术家。 伯恩-琼斯的目标在艺术最好给出了一自己的话说,写信给一个朋友:没有艺术家更加忠于他的目标。理想坚定追求往往引起世界的怨恨,和伯恩-琼斯遇到,忍受和征服的大量愤怒的批评。因为这是针对缺乏现实主义在他的照片,这是无关紧要的。地球,天空,岩石,树木,伯恩-琼斯的男人和女人不是这个世界的,但他们本身就是一个世界,与自己一致,因此拥有自己的现实。控陌生的美丽和梦想,没有梦想的不连贯。然而,这是一个做梦者总是其性质可以穿透这些作品,一个自然的同情斗争和艰苦的行动。伯恩-琼斯的男人和女人是梦想家。这,更重要的是,他的年龄与他疏远诞生了。但他有天生的“起义从事实”就会疏远他的任何年龄的现状。似乎更合理的批评,发现他缺乏等胜利的能源和掌控他的材料将会使他执行他的观念在原始强度。然而,伯恩-琼斯是异常艰苦的生产。他的行业是无穷无尽的,和需要,如果是跟上他的想法的恒压。无论他的画作可能故障,他们总是设计的基本美德,他们总是图片。他的设计被告知的心灵浪漫的脾气,容易发现漂亮的主题,和纯粹的喜悦,充满激情的色彩组合成的斑叶。 

荣誉

伯恩-琼斯1881年获得荣誉学位牛津大学1882年,是一个荣誉研究员。 1885年,他成为了总统伯明翰艺术家协会。在那个时候他开始用连字符号连接他的名字,只是他写数理避免“湮没”邻居的质量。 1893年11月,他走近,看他是否会接受一个男爵的建议,即将离任的总理威廉·尤尔特·格莱斯顿格莱斯顿2月,下面他合法改名为伯恩-琼斯 他被正式创建了一个从男爵Rottingdean,苏塞克斯郡的画眉山庄,在富勒姆的教区,县的伦敦从男爵的英国1894年5月3日, 但仍不高兴接受荣誉,厌恶他的社会主义朋友莫里斯和被他同样蔑视社会主义的妻子乔治亚娜。 只有他的儿子菲利普,混合的设置威尔士亲王并将继承爵位,真正想要的。 

莫里斯在1896年去世,摧毁了伯恩-琼斯的健康大幅下降。1898年,他受到攻击的人流感,显然再次恢复时突然病了,并于1898年6月17日死亡。 六天后,在威尔士亲王的干预,举行了追悼仪式威斯敏斯特教堂。这是第一次一个艺术家有如此荣幸。伯恩-琼斯葬在教堂墓地圣玛格丽特教堂,Rottingdean, 他知道通过夏季家庭假日。

影响

伯恩-琼斯对法国绘画产生了相当大的影响。他还在法国产生了深远的影响象征主义画家,从1889年。 他的作品启发的诗歌斯文本科技大学斯文本科技大学的1866首诗&民谣致力于伯恩-琼斯。

伯恩-琼斯的三个工作室助理,约翰Melhuish斯特拉德威克,T.M.看上去和查尔斯·费尔法克斯莫里,继续成功的绘画事业。穆雷后来成为一个重要的收藏家和尊重艺术品经销商。从1903年到1907年,他卖掉了许多由伯恩-琼斯和工作拉斐尔前派艺术家到伯明翰博物馆和艺术画廊在远低于它们的市场价值。伯明翰博物馆和艺术画廊现在有世界上最大的收藏的伯恩-琼斯的作品,包括大规模的水彩伯利恒之星,画廊在1897年委托。这些画被认为影响了年轻一些j·r·r·托尔金,然后在伯明翰长大。 

伯恩-琼斯也是一个很强的影响伯明翰集团的艺术家,从1890年代开始。

忽视和重新发现

1933年6月16日,总理斯坦利·鲍德温伯恩-琼斯的侄子,正式开幕纪念展览伯恩-琼斯的素描和油画泰特美术馆在伦敦。在展览开幕演讲,鲍德温先生表达了伯恩-琼斯的艺术主张:

在我看来,他所做的对我们老百姓是开放的,从来没有被打开过,神奇的土地的窗扉仙子,他住在他的一生……在内心世界我们可以珍惜和平,美丽,他已经离开我们,至少为自己有和平。为数不多的人知道他,爱他,总是让他在我们心中,但他的工作将继续在我们过世很久之后,。它可能会给消息在一代一代几或在其他更多,但它将永远为那些寻求在他们的一代,对美和那些能够识别和崇敬一个伟大的人,和一个伟大的艺术家。 

但事实上,早在1933年,伯恩-琼斯是无望的过时的艺术世界,其中大部分很快首选的主要趋势现代艺术在建军100周年,展示他的出生是一个悲伤的事情,不参加。 直到1970年代中期,他开始重新工作,再次好评。主要的展览在1989年巴比肯艺术画廊伦敦(在书的形式:约翰基督教,过去的浪漫,1989),追踪伯恩-琼斯的影响下一代的艺术家,和另一个泰特英国美术馆1997年探索英国唯美主义和象征意义之间的联系 

第二个奢华的建军100周年纪念展览——这一次伯恩-琼斯的死亡——举行大都会艺术博物馆之前,1998年在纽约的旅行伯明翰博物馆和艺术画廊和奥赛博物馆、巴黎。 

菲奥娜·麦卡锡伯恩-琼斯的遗产的回顾,指出,他是“一个画家,而典型的维多利亚时代,让我们期待的心理和性反思20世纪早期”。

Early life

Edward Coley Burne Jones (the hyphen came later) was born in Birmingham, the son of a Welshman, Edward Richard Jones, a frame-maker atBennetts Hill, where a blue plaque commemorates the painter's childhood. His mother Elizabeth Coley Jones died within six days of his birth, and he was raised by his grieving father and the family housekeeper, Ann Sampson, an obsessively affectionate but humourless and unintellectual local girl. He attended Birmingham's King Edward VI grammar school from 1844and the Birmingham School of Art from 1848 to 1852, before studying theology at Exeter College, Oxford. At Oxford he became a friend of William Morris as a consequence of a mutual interest in poetry. The two Exeter undergraduates, together with a small group of Jones' friends from Birmingham known as theBirmingham Set,^[5] speedily formed a very close and intimate society, which they called "The Brotherhood". The members of the Brotherhood read John Ruskin and Tennyson, visited churches, and worshipped the Middle Ages. At this time Burne-Jones discovered Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur which was to be so influential in his life. At that time neither Burne-Jones nor Morris knew Rossetti personally, but both were much influenced by his works, and met him by recruiting him as a contributor to their Oxford and Cambridge Magazine which Morris founded in 1856 to promote their ideas.

Burne-Jones had intended to become a church minister, but under Rossetti's influence both he and Morris decided to become artists, and Burne-Jones left college before taking a degree to pursue a career in art. In February 1857, Rossetti wrote to William Bell Scott

Two young men, projectors of the Oxford and Cambridge Magazine, have recently come up to town from Oxford, and are now very intimate friends of mine. Their names are Morris and Jones. They have turned artists instead of taking up any other career to which the university generally leads, and both are men of real genius. Jones's designs are marvels of finish and imaginative detail, unequalled by anything unless perhaps Albert Dürer's finest works.

Marriage and family

In 1856 Burne-Jones became engaged to Georgiana "Georgie" MacDonald (1840–1920), one of the MacDonald sisters. She was training to be a painter, and was the sister of Burne-Jones's old school friend. The couple married in 1860, after which she made her own work in woodcutsand became a close friend of George Eliot. (Another MacDonald sister married the artist Sir Edward Poynter, a further sister married the ironmaster Alfred Baldwin and was the mother of the Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, and yet another sister was the mother of Rudyard Kipling. Kipling and Baldwin were thus Burne-Jones's nephews by marriage).

Georgiana bore a son, Philip, in 1861. A second son, born in the winter of 1864 while Georgiana was gravely ill with scarlet fever, died soon after birth. The family soon moved to 41 Kensington Square, and their daughter Margaret was born there in 1866. In 1867 Burne-Jones and his family settled at the Grange, an 18th-century house set in a large garden in North End, Fulham, London. For much of the 1870s Burne-Jones did not exhibit, following a spate of bitterly hostile attacks in the press, and a passionate affair (described as the "emotional climax of his life") with his Greek model Maria Zambaco, which ended with her trying to commit suicide by throwing herself in Regent's Canal.During these difficult years Georgiana developed a close friendship with Morris, whose wife Jane had fallen in love with Rossetti. Morris and Georgie may have been in love, but if he asked her to leave her husband, she refused. In the end, the Burne-Joneses remained together, as did the Morrises, but Morris and Georgiana were close for the rest of their lives.

In 1880 the Burne-Joneses bought Prospect House in Rottingdean, near Brighton in Sussex, as their holiday home, and soon after the next door Aubrey Cottage to create North End House, reflecting the fact that their Fulham home was in North End Road. (Years later, in 1923,Sir Roderick Jones, head of Reuters, and his wife, playwright and novelist Enid Bagnold, were to add the adjacent Gothic House to the property, which became the inspiration and setting for her play The Chalk Garden).

His troubled son Philip, who became a successful portrait painter, died in 1926. His adored daughter Margaret (died 1953) married John William Mackail (1850–1945), the friend and biographer of Morris, and Professor of Poetry at Oxford from 1911–1916. Their children were the novelists Angela Thirkell and Denis Mackail. In an edition of the boys' magazine, Chums (No. 227, Vol.  V, 13 January 1897), an article on Burne-Jones stated that "....his pet grandson used to be punished by being sent to stand in a corner with his face to the wall. One day on being sent there he was delighted to find the wall prettily decorated with fairies, flowers, birds, and bunnies. His indulgent grandfather had utilised his talent to alleviate the tedium of his favourite's period of penance."

Artistic career

Early years: Rossetti and Morris

Burne-Jones once admitted that after leaving Oxford he "found himself at five-and-twenty what he ought to have been at fifteen". He had had no regular training as a draughtsman, and lacked the confidence of science. But his extraordinary faculty of invention as a designer was already ripening; his mind, rich in knowledge of classical story and medieval romance, teemed with pictorial subjects, and he set himself to complete his set of skills by resolute labour, witnessed by innumerable drawings. The works of this first period are all more or less tinged by the influence of Rossetti; but they are already differentiated from the elder master's style by their more facile though less intensely felt elaboration of imaginative detail. Many are pen-and-ink drawings on vellum, exquisitely finished, of which his Waxen Image(1856) is one of the earliest and best examples. Although the subject, medium and manner derive from Rossetti's inspiration, it is not the hand of a pupil merely, but of a potential master. This was recognized by Rossetti himself, who before long avowed that he had nothing more to teach him.

Burne-Jones's first sketch in oils dates from this same year, 1856, and during 1857 he made for Bradfield College the first of what was to be an immense series of cartoons for stained glass. In 1858 he decorated a cabinet with the Prioress's Tale from Geoffrey Chaucer'sCanterbury Tales, his first direct illustration of the work of a poet whom he especially loved and who inspired him with endless subjects. Thus early, therefore, we see the artist busy in all the various fields in which he was to labour. 

In the autumn of 1857 Burne-Jones joined Morris, Valentine Prinsep, J. R. Spencer Stanhope  and others in Rossetti's ill-fated scheme to decorate the walls of the Oxford Union. None of the painters had mastered the technique of fresco, and their pictures had begun to peel from the walls before they were completed. In 1859 Burne-Jones made his first journey to Italy. He saw Florence, Pisa, Siena, Veniceand other places, and appears to have found the gentle and romantic Sienese more attractive than any other school. Rossetti's influence still persisted, and is visible, more strongly perhaps than ever before, in the two watercolours of 1860, Sidonia von Bork and Clara von Bork. Both paintings illustrate the 1849 gothic novel Sidonia the Sorceress by Lady Wilde, a translation of Sidonia Von Bork: Die Klosterhexe (1847) by Johann Wilhelm Meinhold. 

Decorative arts: Morris & Co.

Main article: Morris & Co.

In 1861, William Morris founded the decorative arts firm of Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co. with Rossetti, Burne-Jones, Ford Madox Brownand Philip Webb as partners, together with Charles Faulkner and Peter Paul Marshall, the former of whom was a member of the Oxford Brotherhood, and the latter a friend of Brown and Rossetti.  The prospectus set forth that the firm would undertake carving, stained glass, metal-work, paper-hangings, chintzes (printed fabrics), and carpets  The decoration of churches was from the first an important part of the business. The work shown by the firm at the 1862 International Exhibition attracted much notice, and within a few years it was flourishing. Two significant secular commissions helped establish the firm's reputation in the late 1860s: a royal project at St. James's Palace and the "green dining room" at the South Kensington Museum (now the Victoria and Albert) of 1867 which featured stained glass windows and panel figures by Burne-Jones 

In 1871 Morris & Co. were responsible for the windows at All Saints, designed by Burne-Jones for Alfred Baldwin, his wife's brother-in-law. The firm was reorganized as Morris & Co. in 1875, and Burne-Jones continued to contribute designs for stained glass, and later tapestries until the end of his career. Stained glass windows in the Christ Church cathedral and other buildings in Oxford are by William Morris & Co. with designs by Burne-Jones Stanmore Hall was the last major decorating commission executed by Morris & Co. before Morris's death in 1896. It was also the most extensive commission undertaken by the firm, and included a series of tapestries based on the story of the Holy Grail for the dining room, with figures by Burne-Jones.

In 1891 Jones was elected a member of the Art Workers Guild.

Illustration work

Although known primarily as a painter, Burne-Jones was also an illustrator, helping the Pre-Raphaelite aesthetic to enter mainstream awareness. In addition, he designed books for the Kelmscott Press between 1892 and 1898. His illustrations appeared in the following books, among others:

• The Fairy Family by Archibald Maclaren (1857)
• The Earthly Paradise by William Morris (not completed)
• The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer by Geoffrey Chaucer (1896)
• Bible Gallery by Dalziel (1881)

Painting

In 1864 Burne-Jones was elected an associate of the Society of Painters in Water-Colours (also known as the Old Water-Colour Society), and exhibited, among other works, The Merciful Knight, the first picture which fully revealed his ripened personality as an artist. The next six years saw a series of fine watercolours at the same gallery.^[11] In 1866 Mrs Cassavetti commissioned Burne-Jones to paint her daughter, Maria Zambaco, in Cupid finding Psyche, an introduction which led to their tragic affair. In 1870, Burne-Jones resigned his membership following a controversy over his painting Phyllis and Demophoön. The features of Maria Zambaco were clearly recognizable in the barely draped Phyllis (as they are in several of Burne-Jones's finest works), and the undraped nakedness of Demophoön coupled with the suggestion of female sexual assertiveness offended Victorian sensibilities. Burne-Jones was asked to make a slight alteration, but instead "withdrew not only the picture from the walls, but himself from the Society."

During the next seven years, 1870–1877, only two works of the painter's were exhibited. These were two water-colours, shown at theDudley Gallery in 1873, one of them being the beautiful Love among the Ruins, destroyed twenty years later by a cleaner who supposed it to be an oil painting, but afterwards reproduced in oils by the painter. This silent period was, however, one of unremitting production. Hitherto Burne-Jones had worked almost entirely in water-colours. He now began a number of large pictures in oils, working at them in turn, and having always several on hand. The first Briar Rose series, Laus Veneris, the Golden Stairs, the Pygmalion series, and The Mirror of Venus are among the works planned and completed, or carried far towards completion, during these years These years also mark the beginnings of Burne-Jones's partnership with the fine-art photographer Frederick Hollyer, whose reproductions of paintings and—especially—drawings would expose a wider audience to Burne-Jones's works in the coming decades.

At last, in May 1877, the day of recognition came, with the opening of the first exhibition of theGrosvenor Gallery, when the Days of Creation, The Beguiling of Merlin, and the Mirror of Venus were all shown. Burne-Jones followed up the signal success of these pictures with Laus Veneris, the Chant d'Amour, Pan and Psyche, and other works, exhibited in 1878. Most of these pictures are painted in brilliant colours. A change is noticeable the next year, 1879, in the Annunciation and in the four pictures making up the second series of Pygmalion and the Image; the former of these, one of the simplest and most perfect of the artist's works, is subdued and sober; in the latter a scheme of soft and delicate tints was attempted, not with entire success. A similar temperance of colours marks The Golden Stairs, first exhibited in 1880. The almost sombre Wheel of Fortune was shown in 1883, followed in 1884 by King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid, in which Burne-Jones once more indulged his love of gorgeous colour, refined by the period of self-restraint. He next turned to two important sets of pictures, The Briar Rose and The Story of Perseus, though these were not completed for some years.

Burne-Jones was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1885, and the following year he exhibited (for the only time) at the Academy, showing The Depths of the Sea, a painting of a mermaid carrying down with her a youth whom she has unconsciously drowned in the impetuosity of her love. This picture adds to the habitual haunting charm a tragic irony of conception and a felicity of execution which give it a place apart among Burne-Jones's works. He formally resigned his Associateship in 1893. One of the Perseus series was exhibited in 1887, two more in 1888, with The Brazen Tower, inspired by the same legend. In 1890 the second series of The Legend of Briar Rose were exhibited by themselves, and won the widest admiration. The huge watercolor, The Star of Bethlehem, painted for the corporation of Birmingham, was exhibited in 1891. A long illness for some time checked the painter's activity, which, when resumed, was much occupied with decorative schemes. An exhibition of his work was held at the New Gallery in the winter of 1892-1893. To this period belong several of his comparatively few portraits. In 1894 Burne-Jones was made a baronet. Ill-health again interrupted the progress of his works, chief among which was the vast Arthur in Avalon. In the winter following his death a second exhibition of his works was held at the New Gallery, and an exhibition of his drawings (including some of the charmingly humorous sketches made for children) at the Burlington Fine Arts Club.

Design for the theatre

In 1894, theatrical manager and actor Henry Irving commissioned Burne-Jones to design sets and costumes for the Lyceum Theatre production of King Arthur by J. Comyns Carr, who was Burne-Jones's patron and the director of the New Gallery as well as a playwright. The play starred Irving as King Arthur and Ellen Terry as Guinevere, and toured America following its London run. Burne-Jones accepted the commission with some enthuisiasm, but was disappointed with much of the final result. He wrote confidentially to his friend Helen Mary Gaskell (known as May), "The armour is good—they have taken pains with it ... Perceval looked the one romantic thing in it ... I hate the stage, don't tell—but I do."^[26]

Aesthetics

Burne-Jones's paintings were one strand in the evolving tapestry of Aestheticism from the 1860s through the 1880s, which considered that art should be valued as an object of beauty engendering a sensual response, rather than for the story or moral implicit in the subject matter. In many ways this was antithetical to the ideals of Ruskin and the early Pre-Raphaelites. Burne-Jones's aim in art is best given in some of his own words, written to a friend:

I mean by a picture a beautiful, romantic dream of something that never was, never will be - in a light better than any light that ever shone - in a land no one can define or remember, only desire - and the forms divinely beautiful - and then I wake up, with the waking of Brynhild.

No artist was ever more true to his aim. Ideals resolutely pursued are apt to provoke the resentment of the world, and Burne-Jones encountered, endured and conquered an extraordinary amount of angry criticism. Insofar as this was directed against the lack of realism in his pictures, it was beside the point. The earth, the sky, the rocks, the trees, the men and women of Burne-Jones are not those of this world; but they are themselves a world, consistent with itself, and having therefore its own reality. Charged with the beauty and with the strangeness of dreams, it has nothing of a dream's incoherence. Yet it is a dreamer always whose nature penetrates these works, a nature out of sympathy with struggle and strenuous action. Burne-Jones's men and women are dreamers too. It was this which, more than anything else, estranged him from the age into which he was born. But he had an inbred "revolt from fact" which would have estranged him from the actualities of any age. That criticism seems to be more justified which has found in him a lack of such victorious energy and mastery over his materials as would have enabled him to carry out his conceptions in their original intensity. Yet Burne-Jones was singularly strenuous in production. His industry was inexhaustible, and needed to be, if it was to keep pace with the constant pressure of his ideas. Whatever faults his paintings may have, they have always the fundamental virtue of design; they are always pictures. His designs were informed with a mind of romantic temper, apt in the discovery of beautiful subjects, and impassioned with a delight in pure and variegated colour.

Honours

In 1881 Burne-Jones received an honorary degree from Oxford, and was made an Honorary Fellow in 1882.^[3] In 1885 he became the President of the Birmingham Society of Artists. At about that time he began hyphenating his name, merely—as he wrote later—to avoid "annihilation" in the mass of Joneses. In November 1893, he was approached to see if he would accept a Baronetcy on the recommendation of the outgoing Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone, the following February he legally changed his name to Burne-Jones  He was formally created a baronet of Rottingdean, in the county of Sussex, and of the Grange, in the parish of Fulham, in the county of London in the baronetage of the United Kingdom on 3 May 1894,but remained unhappy about accepting the honour, which disgusted his socialist friend Morris and was scorned by his equally socialist wife Georgiana Only his son Philip, who mixed with the set of the Prince of Wales and would inherit the title, truly wanted it.

Morris died in 1896, and the health of the devastated Burne-Jones declined substantially. In 1898 he suffered an attack ofinfluenza, and had apparently recovered when he was again taken suddenly ill, and died on 17 June 1898. Six days later, at the intervention of the Prince of Wales, a memorial service was held at Westminster Abbey. It was the first time an artist had been so honoured. Burne-Jones was buried in the churchyard at St Margaret's Church, Rottingdean, a place he knew through summer family holidays.

Influence

Burne-Jones exerted a considerable influence on French painting. He was also highly influential among French symbolist painters, from 1889.^[33] His work inspired poetry by Swinburne – Swinburne's 1866 Poems & Ballads is dedicated to Burne-Jones.

Three of Burne-Jones's studio assistants, John Melhuish Strudwick, T. M. Rooke and Charles Fairfax Murray, went on to successful painting careers. Murray later became an important collector and respected art dealer. Between 1903 and 1907 he sold a great many works by Burne-Jones and the Pre-Raphaelites to the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, at far below their market worth. Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery now has the largest collection of works by Burne-Jones in the world, including the massive watercolour Star of Bethlehem, commissioned for the Gallery in 1897. The paintings are believed by some to have influenced the young J. R. R. Tolkien, then growing up in Birmingham.^[34]

Burne-Jones was also a very strong influence on the Birmingham Group of artists, from the 1890s onwards.

Neglect and rediscovery

On 16 June 1933, Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, a nephew of Burne-Jones, officially opened the centenary exhibition featuring Burne-Jones's drawings and paintings at the Tate Gallery in London. In his opening speech at the exhibition, Mr Baldwin expressed what the art of Burne-Jones stood for:

In my view, what he did for us common people was to open, as never had been opened before, magic casements of a land of faery in which he lived throughout his life ... It is in that inner world we can cherish in peace, beauty which he has left us and in which there is peace at least for ourselves. The few of us who knew him and loved him well, always keep him in our hearts, but his work will go on long after we have passed away. It may give its message in one generation to a few or in other to many more, but there it will be for ever for those who seek in their generation, for beauty and for those who can recognise and reverence a great man, and a great artist.^[35]

But, in fact, long before 1933, Burne-Jones was hopelessly out-of-fashion in the art world, much of which soon preferred the major trends in Modern art, and the exhibit marking the 100th anniversary of his birth was a sad affair, poorly attended.^[36] It was not until the mid-1970s that his work began to be re-assessed and once again acclaimed. A major exhibit in 1989 at the Barbican Art Gallery, London (in book form as: John Christian, The Last Romantics, 1989), traced Burne-Jones's influence on the next generation of artists, and another at Tate Britain in 1997 explored the links between British Aestheticism and Symbolism.^[33]

A second lavish centenary exhibit – this time marking the 100th anniversary of Burne-Jones's death – was held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1998, before traveling to the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery and the Musée d'Orsay, Paris.^[37]

Fiona MacCarthy, in a review of Burne-Jones's legacy, notes that he was "a painter who, while quintessentially Victorian, leads us forward to the psychological and sexual introspection of the early twentieth century"