Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, Bt., ARA, RWS

(British, 1833-1898)

Study of a nude standing woman leaning against a rock with a flaming staff in her left hand for Venus in Venus Epithalamia

Footnotes

Provenance
Private collection, USA.

The present work was made circa 1869 during a transitional period in which the artist underwent a serious reappraisal of his work. Moving from a medieval bias into a period more influenced by the later Italian Renaissance, he emerged from the more restricted Pre-Raphaelite circles and the inhibitions of family under the influence of his affair with Maria Zambaco. These new elements indicated his growing maturity as man and artist.

Made at the height of the passionate relationship, this drawing reflects the intensity that the artist felt. It is one of the most sensual drawings that he made and portrays Venus in a rocky alcove, which was transformed in the final painting into an interior with her standing beside an altar. The figure holds a bridal torch which was associated with Hymen, the God of Weddings, which is later explained in the painting Venus Epithalamia, where Venus is by an altar upon which a figure of Cupid stands. A bridal procession is in the background. An epithalmium was a poem composed on the event of a wedding. The model was one that Burne-Jones had used throughout the 'Cupid and Psyche' series of illustrations to William Morris's The Earthly Paradise. There she is represented as sweetly innocent, in contrast to the eroticism contained in the present drawing. In the subsequent painting Maria's head has been super-imposed upon the body of the model.

It is interesting to note that in the background of the painting of Venus Epithalamia is a procession of maidens descending stairs. It would appear therefore to be a precursor of the huge painting The Golden Stairs, begun two years later. First entitled The King's Wedding, the idea of the later work would seem to have arisen from this project. It postulates a depth of meaning for the artist not initially apparent to the viewer. Usually The Golden Stairs is seen as an aesthetic work without such debate regarding the quality of innocence. When compared, the two paintings reveal the all too obvious absence of Maria in the later work and the inter-relation suggests more significance for the painting than initially is evident.

The are grateful to William Waters for compiling this catalogue entry. The work is listed in the Burne-Jones catalogue raisonné, www.eb-j.org.