Physical description
Claxton, the daughter of a painter, produced this watercolour as a satire on the work and ideas of the Pre-Raphaelites. It caused a sensation when it was exhibited at the Portland Gallery (where the Pre-Raphaelites themselves had exhibited), and was reproduced as a full-page spread in the Illustrated London News, a high-circulation national weekly magazine. The satire is packed with references to the PRB painters and their pictures. Millais plays the part of Paris choosing the most beautiful from the three graces, and is awarding the golden apple, not to a Raphaelesque Madonna or a contemporary contender, but to an angular medieval figure who represents the Pre-Raphaelite ideal. The 'truth-to-nature' precept is parodied by the man examining the surface of the outside wall with opera glasses.
Place of Origin
England, Great Britain (probably, made)
Date
1860 (painted)
Artist/maker
Claxton, Florence, born 1835 (artist)
Materials and Techniques
Watercolour, heightened with gold paint and gun arabic
Marks and inscriptions
FLORENCE CLAXTON
As a cock was scratching in a farm-yard he came upon a jewel. "Oh", said he, "You're a very fine thing no doubt, but, give me a barley-corn before all the pearls in the world". Aesop
Dimensions
Height: 26.8 cm from catalogue, Width: 37.8 cm from catalogue, Height: 435 mm gilt frame, Width: 535 mm gilt frame, Depth: 35 mm gilt frame
Object history note
Provenance: Sotheby's, Nineteenth Century European Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture, 20 June 1989, lot 28.
The original version of this work was exhibited at the Institution of Fine Arts at the Portland Gallery, London, in 1860 (no.176, price 12-12-0, now collection of W E Fredeman) and was engraved for The Illustrated London News XXXVI (2 June 1860) p.541, with an explanatory text on p.542; another explanatory text, framed, was purchased with the watercolour (E.1224a-1989). Fredeman reproduces a third version (present whereabouts unknown). There are several differences in detail between the three versions and the engraving. The work satirises the archaising and "truth to nature" principles of the pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and their circle. In particular, it parodies paintings from 1848 to 1859 by Holman Hunt (the Light of the World, Claudio and Isabella, the Scapegoat, The Hireling Sheperd, the Awakening Conscious), Brett (The Stonebreaker), Millais (the Blind Girl, Apple Blossoms, The Vale of Rest, A Dream of the Past, Isabella), Calderon (Broken Vows), Windus (Burd Helen), Deverall (A Pet), William Henry Hunt (Oyster Shell and Onion) and Ford Madox Brown (Christ Washing Peter's Feet). Among other episodes are - principally - Millais as Paris awarding the golden apple to a Pre-Raphaelite beauty rather that Raphael's Madonna (taken from the Brera Marriage of the Virgin) or a woman in contemporary dress; the portraits of Raphael, Reynolds and Van Dyck hung facing the wall and above those of Millais, Ruskin amd P T Barnum; a haloed man peering at a woman's toe-nails through a magnifying glass; a figure labelled 'Middle Ages' closing the back door on a classiclly-robed figure (taken from Raphael's Sistine Chapel tapestry cartoons); a man examining the outside wall through an opera-glass.
Descriptive line
Watercolour by Florence Claxton, 'the Choice of Paris: An Idyll', 1860
Bibliographic References (Citation, Note/Abstract, NAL no)
William E Fredman, 'Pre-Raphaelites in Caricature: 'The Choice of Paris: An Idyll' by Florence Claxton', Burlington Magazine CII (December 1960), pp.523-9, repro. two other versions.
Colin Cruise Pre-Raphaelite Drawing London: Thames & Hudson, 2011. ISBN: 978-0-7093-0264-3
Tim Barringer, Jason Rosenfeld, Alison Smith, London, Tate Publishing: 2012. ISBN: 978-1-84976-015-7.
Exhibition History
Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant Garde (Tate Britain 12 Sept 2012-13 Jan 2013)
Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant Garde (National Gallery of Art, Washington DC February 2013-May 2013)
Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant Garde (Tate Britain 12/09/2012-13/01/2013)
The Poetry of Drawing: Pre Raphaelite Studies, Designs and Watercolours (The Art Gallery of New South Wales (Sydney) 17/06/2011-04/09/2011)
The Poetry of Drawing: Pre Raphaelite Studies, Designs and Watercolours (Gas Hall, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery 29/01/2011-15/05/2011)
Subjects depicted
Clothing; Satire; Interiors; Paintings
Categories
Drawings; Caricatures & Cartoons; Paintings
Collection code
PDP
