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Course: Europe 1800 - 1900 > Unit 4
Lesson 2: The Pre-Raphaelites and mid-Victorian art- A Beginner's Guide to the Pre-Raphaelites
- The Aesthetic Movement
- Pre-Raphaelites: Curator's choice - Millais's Isabella
- Sir John Everett Millais, Isabella
- Sir John Everett Millais, Christ in the House of His Parents
- Sir John Everett Millais, Christ in the House of His Parents
- Sir John Everett Millais, Ophelia
- Sir John Everett Millais, Ophelia
- Millais, Ophelia
- Millais, Mariana
- Millais, Mariana
- Millais, Portrait of John Ruskin
- A Portrait of John Ruskin and Masculine Ideals of Dress in the Nineteenth Century
- Sir John Everett Millais, Spring (Apple Blossoms)
- Millais, The Vale of Rest
- Millais, The Vale of Rest
- John Everett Millais, Bubbles
- Hunt, Claudio and Isabella
- Hunt, Claudio and Isabella
- Hunt, Our English Coasts ("Strayed Sheep")
- Hunt, Our English Coasts ("Strayed Sheep")
- Hunt, Our English Coasts
- Hunt, the Awakening Conscience
- Hunt, The Awakening Conscience
- William Holman Hunt, Isabella or the Pot of Basil
- William Holman Hunt, The Lady of Shalott
- William Holman Hunt, The Shadow of Death
- William Holman Hunt, The Scapegoat
- Ford Madox Brown, Work
- Ford Madox Brown, The Last of England
- Ford Madox Brown, The Last of England
- Ford Madox Brown, Work
- Pre-Raphaelites: Curator's choice - Ford Madox Brown's 'Work'
- Rossetti, Ecce Ancilla Domini
- Rossetti, Beata Beatrix
- Rossetti, Proserpine
- Wallis, Chatterton
- Wallis, Chatterton
- William Powell Frith, Derby Day
- Dyce's Pegwell Bay, Kent - a Recollection of October 5th, 1858
- Dyce, Pegwell Bay, Kent - a Recollection of October 5th, 1858
- Emily Mary Osborn, Nameless and Friendless
- John Roddam Spencer Stanhope, Thoughts of the Past
- John Roddam Spencer Stanhope, Thoughts of the Past
- Burne-Jones, The Golden Stairs
- Burne-Jones, The Golden Stairs
- Burne-Jones, King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid
- Burne-Jones, King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid
- Sleeping Beauty — but without the Kiss: Burne-Jones and the Briar Rose series
- Burne-Jones, The Depths of the Sea
- Burne-Jones, Hope
- Burne-Jones, Hope
- Sir Edward Burne-Jones, four stained glass windows at Birmingham Cathedral
- Waterhouse, The Lady of Shalott
- William Butterfield, All Saints, Margaret Street
- William Morris, The Green Dining Room
- William Morris and Philip Webb, Red House
- Pre-Raphaelites
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Ford Madox Brown, Work
Ford Madox Brown, Work, 1852–65, oil on canvas, 137 x 198 cm (Manchester Art Gallery). A conversation with Dr. Steven Zucker and Dr. Beth Harris. Created by Smarthistory.
Video transcript
(piano music) - [Dr. Beth] We're in the
Manchester City Art Gallery and we're looking at one of
the most famous paintings in their collection. And one of the most famous paintings of the Victorian era, Ford
Madox Brown's painting, "Work". And it's a painting that he worked on for more than a decade. - [Dr. Steven] There were so
many figures in this painting but the three in the
center really stand out. The man standing heartily
drinking his beer. Below that, a man stooped, shoveling dirt. And then, just behind him, a man standing on a
platform and adding dirt to a large pile. They are navvies. Excavators. We think that they're digging
a trench for a new waterline, but they are heroized. They aren't ennobled - [Dr. Beth] And he's comparing
the heroism of their labor with other kinds of labor. We have father and a daughter,
members of the upper classes. The man likely a member of parliament. Below that, a woman distributing leaflets about her charity work on
behalf of the working classes. And in front of that figure, we see a woman carrying a
parasol, beautifully dressed, who doesn't seem to be
engaged in work at all. And then in front of that, a really interesting
and problematic figure, who's clearly impoverished,
selling weeds, flowers. A male figure who's clearly set off in what Brown calls his effeminacy
against the male heroism of the central navvies. Brown describes this figure
as someone who has not been taught the value of work. - [Dr. Steven] Mirroring
this arc of figures stacked on the left is another
gentle arc on the right. Here we see a variety of
workers including a beer seller. But this arc leads our eye
down to a group of children. In the center we see a young girl. She's wearing a dress that's
much too large for her and she's holding a child
who's got a little black ribbon which signifies that
their mother has died. And so this young girl has taken on this maternal responsibility. With her left hand holding a child but with her right, she's
disciplining her brother. - [Dr. Beth] And on the other side of her is a young girl that she's also in charge of who's eating
the end of a carrot. - [Dr. Steven] So the vast
majority of the painting is given over to this contrast
of different elements of society and the heroism of labor. But there's a different kind
of labor that's exhibited by the two men who stand in shadow and look upon this scene
very much the way that we do. - [Dr. Beth] These are two
men who theorized about labor. about work. On the left, Thomas Carlisle. And on the right we see F.D. Maurice. Both of these men approached the problems of the working classes during
this period in different ways. It's really interesting to me that this is a painting called "Work." But the workers who were probably most on everyone's mind are not included here. So we don't see industrial labor, we don't see factory labor. We don't see the work of tailors and other artisans who
are being put out of work. We're looking at a moment in history of the emergence of a working class and a working class that
feels its political power. But this is a painting that
heroizes manual labor here, not agricultural labor, which would be the more
traditional kind of work, but manual labor in the city. - [Dr. Steven] But the
artist does make room in this painting for agricultural workers who have lost their livelihood. And we can identify them by
the agricultural implements that surround them. There's also a family group. We see a mother feeding her child. We see a man, and we know that
they're poor and displaced. - [Dr. Beth] This is, in a way, the most sympathetic part of the painting. And Brown is showing us how
this family is neglected and impoverished in the modern city. And I think it points to a central paradox that was
keenly felt during this time which was that England was a
place of tremendous wealth. It had propelled the
industrial revolution, but at the same time it
had impoverished so many. And that conflict was referred to as the Condition-of-England problem. And Carlisle, one of the brain workers
that we see on the right, wrote, "The condition of
England is justly regarded as one of the most ominous, and
withal one of the strangest, ever seen in this world.
England is full of wealth... supply for human want in every kind; yet England is dying." And there were so many
people at this moment looking for a solution,
not least of which, because the working classes
were feeling their power. The Chartists were presenting
petitions to Parliament demanding suffrage, demanding
the right to vote for men. - [Dr. Steven] And the vote was critical because labor reforms for
one, were so badly needed. - [Dr. Beth] And Brown is asking, who is going to fix this problem? Is it a member of parliament? Is it the woman who's
handing out leaflets? Is it the thinkers on the right? - [Dr. Steven] It's certainly
not the political campaigning that we see in a little
vignette in the extreme right. The artist seems to be
saying that honest work outside in the sunlight
is what will save England. - [Dr. Beth] And we have biblical quotes on the frame that reinforce that idea. But I also think it's
important to step back and note the incredible modernity of what we're looking at, the city street where the
artist is capturing the effect of sunlight. - [Dr. Steven] He painted
it largely on location in Hampstead, London. - [Dr. Beth] The idea of truth-to-nature. - [Dr. Steven] This is
such a modern scene. We have the sense of
the bustle of the city, of people moving past each other, of glimpses of figures,
of fragments of figures. This is the complexity of urban experience and it has a moral underpinning. He's asking bigger questions. (piano music)