In any case, British painting was a distinctly parochial affair. The departure from the policy of ‘Splendid Isolation’ in the field of diplomacy had not, as yet, been mirrored in the world of art. Although they had been established in Paris for decades, the Impressionists received a lukewarm reception in London, where painters continued to labour under what Vanessa Bell described as a ‘Victorian cloud’, either tinkering with the effects of light or harking back to the Pre-Raphaelites.
