Pre-Raphaelite Art

In 1848, a group of young British artists formed a secret club. They called themselves the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. They thought art had become boring and wanted to make it exciting again. They painted with bright colors and incredible detail. Every leaf, flower, and strand of hair was carefully shown. They loved painting scenes from legends, poems, and Shakespeare's plays.

A Secret Brotherhood

Seven young men started the group. The main artists were Dante Gabriel Rossetti, John Everett Millais, and William Holman Hunt. They signed their paintings with the letters PRB. At first, critics did not like their work. They thought it was odd and too bright. But over time, people grew to love the detailed, glowing paintings. The famous writer Charles Dickens even wrote about them.

Nature and Legends

Pre-Raphaelite artists painted outdoors to get nature exactly right. Every rock and flower was real. John Everett Millais painted Ophelia floating in a stream surrounded by wildflowers. It took months to finish. The models sometimes posed in cold water or held still for hours. The Pre-Raphaelites also loved stories about King Arthur and medieval knights.

Fun Facts

• The model for the painting Ophelia lay in a bathtub of water for so long that she caught a bad cold.
• The Pre-Raphaelites got their name because they wanted to paint like artists who lived before the painter Raphael.
• Some Pre-Raphaelite paintings are so detailed that you can identify every single type of plant and flower in them.

Did You Know?

The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was so secret at first that they would not tell anyone what the letters PRB on their paintings stood for!