Burne-Jones

Sir Edward Coley Burne Jones (1833-1898) was a master of drawing, painted glass and ceramic art.

Initially impressed to the quick by Botticelli, Mantegna and Michelangelo, he later turned to Gabriel Rossetti and the early Pre- Raphaelites.Little concerned with the details of daily reality, he probed medieval literature for new themes and produced works that idolize Victorian values and the Englishwoman.

These ancient legends gave him a freedom of expression elsewhere denied in a society dominated by Queen Victoria, famous if not notorious for always dressing in black.

Burne-Jones was the epitome of politically correct licentiousness, as a recent London exhibition made delightfully plain to all.