The same complaint recurs in the following year, when Punch is moved, as the result of visiting all the exhibitions then open to ask certain questions:—
Is painting a living art in England at this moment?
Is there a nineteenth century?
Are there men and women round about us, doing, acting, suffering?
Is the subject matter of Art, clothes? Or is it men and women, their actions, passions and sufferings?
If Art is vital, should it not somehow find food among living events, interests, and incidents? Is our life, at this day, so unideal, so devoid of all sensuous and outward picturesqueness and beauty, that for subjects to paint we must needs go back to the Guelphs and Ghibellines, or to Charles the Second, or William the Third, or George the Second?
CONVENT THOUGHTS
The P.R.B.
But much more interesting than these generalities—sound and sensible though they are—is the first reference to "certain young friends of mine, calling themselves—the dear silly boys—Pre-Raphaelites" in the same volume. It must certainly be admitted that in his earlier criticisms of the P.R.B.'s Mr. Punch managed to dissemble his affection pretty effectively. The initial compliment in the notice of 1851 is largely discounted by what follows:—
Our dear and promising young friends, the Pre-Raphaelites, deserve especial commendation for the courage with which they have dared to tell some most disagreeable truths on their canvases this year. Mr. Ruskin was quite right in taking up the cudgels against The Times on this matter. The pictures of the P.R.B. are true, and that's the worst of them. Nothing can be more wonderful than the truth of Collins's representation of the Alisma Plantago, except the unattractiveness of the demure lady, whose botanical pursuits he has recorded under the name of CONVENT THOUGHTS.... By the size of the lady's head he no doubt meant to imply her vast capacity of brains—while by the utter absence of form and limb under the robe, he subtly conveys that she has given up all thoughts of making a figure in the world.
Mr. Millais's "Mariana in the moated Grange" is obviously meant to insinuate a delicate excuse for the gentleman who wouldn't come—and to show the world the full import of Tennyson's description:—
then said she, "I am very dreary."
Anything drearier than the lady, or brighter than her blue velvet robe, it is impossible to conceive.
MARIANA IN THE MOATED GRANGE
But Punch makes the amende most handsomely in 1852:—