| John William Waterhouse |
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| CATEGORIES ABOUT JOHN WILLIAM WATERHOUSE | |
| 1849 births | |
| waterhouse, john william | |
| 1917 deaths | |
| english painters | |
| pre-raphaelite brotherhood | |
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John William Waterhouse ( April 6 , 1849 – February 10 , 1917 ) was a British Neo-classical and Pre-Raphaelite Painter most famous for his paintings of female characters from Mythology and Literature . EARLY LIFE He was born in Rome to the painters William and Isabela Waterhouse, but when he was five the family moved to South Kensington , near the newly founded Victoria And Albert Museum . He studied painting under his father before entering the Royal Academy schools in 1870 . His early works were of classical themes in the spirit of Alma-Tadema and Frederic Leighton , and were exhibited at the Royal Academy, the Society Of British Artists and the Dudley Gallery . LATER CAREER In 1874 , at the age of twenty-five, Waterhouse submitted the classical Allegory ''Sleep and His Half-Brother Death'' to the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition. The painting was very well received and he exhibited at the RA almost every year afterwards until his death in 1917 . In 1883 he married Esther Kenworthy , the daughter of an art schoolmaster from Ealing who had exhibited her own flower-paintings at the Royal Academy and elsewhere. They had two children, but both died in childhood. In 1895 Waterhouse was elected to the status of full Academician. He taught at the St. John's Wood Art School , joined the St John's Wood Arts Club, and served on the Royal Academy Council. Waterhouse's most famous painting is '' The Lady Of Shalott '', a study of Elaine Of Astolat , who dies of grief when Lancelot will not love her. He actually painted three different versions of this character, in 1888 , 1896 , and 1916 . In the painting of Ophelia by John William Waterhouse, Ophelia takes her time to prepare for her death with flowers. It looks as if it takes place in a forest near a lake. The lake is dark, and it is filled with lily pads, showing behind Ophelia. The picture is focused on Ophelia putting flowers in her hair as she sits on a branch leaning over the lake, right on the boundary between land and water. The grass is tall enough to notice in the foreground of the painting. Ophelia is surrounded by the greens and browns of the natural setting. Ophelia is sitting on tall but small branches which are growing out of the water in the left side of the painting. Ophelia is wearing an elegant white long dress with gold trimming around the waist, wrists, and at the bottom of the dress in a fancy design. The gold trim also has pearls or beads, colored red, blue, green, and white. Her head is tilted back, silhouette style, facing away from the painter where the viewer can only see her left eye, the side of her nose, and half her of lips. Her right arm is lifted up near her right ear so the observer can not see her hand. Her left hand is slightly lifted near her neck touching her hair softly. Ophelia’s long, red, stringy hair has red and white flowers tied into it. She has white daisies resting on her lap. This painting has light and dark shading. The trees and the water surrounding Ophelia are dark. Ophelia is the lightest shade of the painting because it is focused on her. She has a rosy tan complexion. She looks as if she is finding peace and pleasure. With his great accomplishments throughout his oil paintings he had to enter a work of art for his RA diploma (Artmagick 2). The painting he wanted to submit was titled A Mermaid, but, unfortunately, it was not completed so he suggested that they take a temporary painting until it was completed. He decided to turn in, temporarily, the Ophelia painting of 1888. After the submission the painting was lost until the 20th Century, and it is now displayed in the collection of Lord Lloyd Webber (ArtMagick 2). John William Waterhouse was interested with women dying in or near water. This gives explanation of his interest with Ophelia, since she died in water. It is said that this idea may have also come to him because of the paintings by Rossetti, Horatio Discovering the Madness of Ophelia and also from the painting by Millais’s, Ophelia. J.W. Waterhouse imitated Millais’ work by adding some of the same ideas to his work. He added the idea of the lack of sunlight and the foreground. In Trippi’s book J.W. Waterhouse, another version of the Ophelia painting was completed in 1894 (133-5). In this description of Ophelia, J.W. Waterhouse shows her right before her death. The article, entitled “Ophelia,” states that “certain aspects of the composition underline the mortal turn of events: the poppies in Ophelia’s hair, for example, laden with the symbolism of sleep and death” (Trippi 1-2). The time of finishing the same painting varies throughout two different books. In Hobson’s book The Art and Life of J.W. Waterhouse RA, the Ophelia painting was finished in 1910 (173). Waterhouse started a collection of Ophelia paintings, which were never finished because his illness of cancer started to become unbearable during the year of 1915. Trippi suggests that John William Waterhouse may have revisited Ophelia in early 1909 after his 1894 painting hung in the Academy in the McCulloch collection. His third Ophelia painting was shown in the Summer Exhibition in 1910. In 1915 he started giving “three to five” paintings to the Academy for the next couple of years. Even though the Ophelia series was never finished, a drawing titled A Study for ‘Ophelia in the Churchyard’ was entered in the 1926 sale, years after his death of cancer in 1917. Records show that there is no painting titled the same as what was entered in the sale, so they are considering it to be the Ophelia painting where she is sitting on the branch (Hobson 174). His grave can be found at Kensal Green Cemetery in London . WORKS |
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| "http://wwwinformationdelightinfo/encyclopedia/entry/Ophelia" class="copylinks">Ophelia '' |
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| "http://wwwinformationdelightinfo/encyclopedia/entry/Diogenes_of_Sinope" class="copylinks">Diogenes '' (1882) |
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