OSHER 547 - Victorian Renaissance Art: Painting Ritual and Religion in the Nineteenth Century

The Victorian era was a time of shifting beliefs about the world and about religion. Artists responded to these changes by painting both pagan and early Christian rituals and history. From Pre-Raphaelite perspectives on medieval Christianity to the Olympian, classical masterworks depicting lush, ancient pagan processionals, artists created images of beauty, symbolism and insight that continue to affect our perceptions of the past. These works will be analyzed for their impact on art and our ideas about religion and rituals as they were emerging during the nineteenth-century spread of Empire. The works of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Frederic Leighton, John Everett Millais, John William Waterhouse, Evelyn De Morgan, Lawrence Alma-Tadema, John Singer Sargent, and many others will be presented within their artistic and religious backgrounds, along with their lasting cultural significance.