Victorian Visual Arts

1. Victorian Visual Arts By Nick Voss and Davis Wick

2. Overview • Time Frame – During the rule of Queen Victoria (1837-1901) • The Royal Academy of Arts in London was founded in 1768, for the purpose of cultivating and improving the arts of painting, sculpture, and architecture. • The active members of the Royal Academy are divided into Academicians (painters, sculptors, architects, and engravers), Associates, and Associate Engravers.  • Victorian art’s vibrant colors represented the high society of England which was dominated by Queen Victoria's 64-year reign.

3. Overview cont. • Art styles varied somewhat during the Victorian art period because of the huge advances made in photographic and architectural technology. • The Victorian Era of art began with a return of the classic realism which was popular during the height of the ancient Roman and Greek Empires. • Victorian art was produced by a series of artists who were mainly focused in England’s high-fashion and modern elegance.

4. Victorian Architecture • There was an abundant revival of styles: Greek Revival (1825-1850), Gothic Revival (1840 and 1880) and a return to Renaissance forms. • As the world grew towards industrialization, Victorian architecture became more complicated and elaborate. • Prominent styles were Italianate (1840-1890), Second Empire (1855-1885), Stick-Eastlake (1860-1890) • Greek Revival style was used for public buildings where simplicity was considered the most important attribute. • Most early homes, especially in England, were built of stone. • There was never a large number of full-blown Gothic Stone homes • Only wealthy could afford Gothic homes because they required labor of very highly skilled stone carvers • Victorians went deeper into history, nature, geometry, theory, and personal inspiration to create their designs more than ever before. • The later part of the 19th century brought new attitude toward color. • Houses used to be painted in one color: white, beige or gray. But by 1887 many people were painting their houses in lighter, brighter colors

5. Victorian Architecture Questions. • What is Victorian architecture? • A style of architecture used in Britain during the reign of Queen Victoria; characterized by massive construction and elaborate ornamentation • What are its influences, characteristics? • The influences of Victorian architecture cause the buildings to become much more elaborate. They became much more colorful than they were previously. • What is the Gothic revival? • The Gothic Revival was part spiritual movement. It came about as a result of the Industrial Revolution. It was a romantic yearning for the traditional, comforting past

6. Victorian Architecture Questions. • What were the major landmarks and buildings constructed in the era? • Highclere Castle, which is in Hampshire and Kelham Hall, which is in Nottinghamshire. The Palace of Westminster was constructed during this time period to house the royal family. It was also known as the Houses of Parliament. • Who were A.W. Pugin, William Holman Hunt, John Ruskin, Charles Rennie Mackintosh? What were their major contributions to the arts? • AW Pugin was a Victorian architect. He is known as a pioneer for the Gothic Revival. William Holman Hunt was an English painter and was a founder of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, a group of English painters. John Ruskin was the leading art critic of the Victorian era. Rennie Mackintosh was a Scottish architect and artist. He had an incredible impact on European art and design as he was the main representative of Art Nouveau in the United Kingdom • What are characteristics of Victorian Gothic architecture? • Characteristics of Victorian Gothic architecture are that they are “throwbacks.” This means that the architecture has a resemblance of the past. The houses were made of stone and were very expensive.

7. Victorian Painting • How were these illustrations produced? • Victorian illustrations were produced by using water colors and oil painting. Other illustrations were engraved on woodblocks. This was for people that were not as wealthy. • What media were used (e.g., woodblock engraving)? • Illustrations could be made using oil painting but that was very expensive. Another alternative for artists that could not afford oil painting was woodblock engraving. • What were the major characteristics of painting, drawing, sculpture, and design during the era? • The major characteristics of the art during the Victorian era were that the art was romantic, and classical. Houses were often very large. In late Victorian times, however, the style changed to a more simple style. • What was the pre-Raphaelite brotherhood? • An influential group of mid-nineteenth-century avantegarde painters associated with Ruskin who had great effect upon British, American, and European art.

8. Victorian Painting cont.

9. Victorian Sculpture • There were many different types of subjects for Victorian Era sculptures. Some of them were: • Gods and Goddesses • Aphrodite • Hermes • Mercury • Biblical Subjects • Eve • Moses

10. Victorian Sculpture cont. • Arthurian and Medieval • The Lady of the Lake • Shakespearean Subjects • Ophelia • Modern Life • Children • Sports • Work • Another common theme comes as no surprise, many sculptures of Queen Victoria were made during and after this time period.

11. Victorian Design • The early part of Queen Victoria’s reign saw an interest in a medieval or Gothic Revival in all aspects of design. • The mid to late parts of Victoria’s reign saw the lush, abundant and cluttered look that most people associate with the term “Victorian.” • Victorian taste and design varied based on social class and economic status. • For example, the members of nobility, who lived in homes owned by their families for generations, were not too likely to replace their perfectly good furniture with and examples of a new style. • The members of the working and lower classes did not have the money to furnish their homes with Victorian design.

12. Victorian Design cont. • So therefore, the Victorian style was mainly used by the professional and middle classes. • Factory owners in the industrial North also used the Victorian style • Along with those three, the Victorian style was used by a few very wealthy trendsetters.

13. Victorian Illustration • The engraved boxwood block, the single most significant piece of illustration technology, dominated early Victorian book illustration. The first book to be illustrated was Thomas Bewick's The General History of Quadrupeds(1790).  • In The Art of Engraving by T.H Fielding described two kinds of woodblocks. • In one kind, the artist used India ink for the main tints and a pencil for the final details. • In the other, the artist drew on the block every line that he intended to his engraver to incise. • Since the material used in both cases was boxwood, and the box is a tree with a trunk of small diameter, any illustration over five square inches had to be engraved on a composite box, which was a block composed of two or more separate pieces of boxwood glued together • Between 1850 and 1900, about 1200 “art” books were produced in Britain.

14. Victorian Illustration cont. • A very different type of pictorial technology co-existed with the woodblock, the etching. • In this system, the surface was made of a copper or steel plate. • With a lead pencil, the artist would copy the picture on tracing paper, he would then run the paper and plate together through a rolling press to transfer the image to the plate. • An illustration from Thomas Bewick's  • The General History of Quadrupeds

15. Works Cited • (No Author). “Architecture.” Victorian Station. 1999. <http://www.victorianstation.com/vicarch.html> • (No Author). “Victorian Architecture.” Victorian Web. 11 Sept. 2012 <http://www.victorianweb.org/art/architecture/index.html> • (No Author). “Word Net.” Princeton University. 18 Aug. 2012 <http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=victorian%20architecture> • Ross, David. “Victorian England.” Britain Express. 2011 <http://www.britainexpress.com/History/Victorian_index.htm> • (No Author). “The Victorian Artists.” Avictorian. 2009 <http://www.avictorian.com/victorianart.html> • (No Author). “Victorian Painting.” Victorian Web. 24 May. 2012 <http://www.victorianweb.org/painting/index.html> • (No Author). “Victorian Sculpture: A List of Subjects.” 12 Apr. 2009 <http://www.victorianweb.org/sculpture/subjects.html>