G. F. Watts

by Mark Bills, Barbara Bryant

Widely regarded as a genius and as the greatest painter of the Victorian age, George Frederic Watts (1817–1904) was a ceaseless experimenter throughout his seventy-year career. He was not only the finest and most penetrating portraitist of his age but also a sculptor, landscape painter, and symbolist. This beautifully illustrated book encompasses the work of his entire career, from his early self-portrait in 1834 and first exhibited painting in the Royal Academy in 1837 to his most iconic work, Hope, and the remarkable, almost abstract painting, Sower of the Systems, completed in 1903. In addition, the book includes historic photographs and archival materials, especially concerning the establishment in 1904 of the Watts Picture Gallery in Compton, Surrey, for the permanent exhibition of his art. Essays by leading scholars examine the artist’s output, life, reception, and legacy.

Genres: Art

310 pages, Hardcover

First published January 20, 2009

Reviews

[Monty Milne · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a big coffee table book with lavish and detailed descriptions of all the paintings (and sculptures) by this worthy Victorian master (maybe at times a little too detailed). One gets a sense of the artist's high moral purpose: he took himself, and his art, very seriously indeed. (His nudes manage to be beautiful without being prurient - no easy task to my mind - compare and contrast the nudes of Lord Leighton or Alma-Tadema). Watts was a compassionate and likeable man who used his art to further some wholly laudable concerns (trying to stop the extermination of rare birds for the millinery trade, for example). He also had a sensitive and brilliant artistic imagination, revealed especially in his approach to paintings with titles such as "The Genius of Greek Poetry". I don't know what I'd have produced if asked to paint something to go with a title like that, but I do know that Watts produced something very beautiful and very thought-provoking.