Love and the Maiden is an 1877 oil painting (previously mistaken for tempera) on canvas, by English Pre-Raphaelite artist John Roddam Spencer Stanhope, that is now in the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.See Art sales: Stanhope's maiden tells a tale, article on The Telegraph, 27 January 2003.
History Known as one of the "second-generation" of Pre-Raphaelites, Stanhope was among Dante Gabriel Rossetti's mural-painting party at the Oxford Union in 1857, together with Arthur Hughes, John Hungerford Pollen, Valentine Prinsep, Edward Burne-Jones and William Morris. He was a founder member of the Hogarth Club, a direct descendant of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.A.M.W. Stirling, "The Life of Roddam Spencer Stanhope, Pre-Raphaelite, a Painter of Dreams," in A Painter of Dreams and Other Biographical Studies (London: Lane, 1916).
This painting is considered one of Stanhope's best, and represents two radically different artistic phases of his life. Although he began as fervently Pre-Raphaelite in outlook, Stanhope was deeply attracted by the Aesthetic movement during the 1860s. Love and the Maiden is a succinct mingling of these two equally formative phases in his career. Its presence in the 1877 exhibition at the Grosvenor Gallery — Aestheticism's most famous exposé — demonstrates his adherence to the latter movement, whereas the painting's similarity to the work of Edward Burne-Jones and Dante Gabriel Rossetti — the group of dancing women in the background are similar to those portrayed by Rossetti in The Bower Meadow (1871–72) — betray Stanhope's Pre-Raphaelite background.
During his time in Oxford in 1857, Stanhope wrote that he spent most days painting with Burne-Jones;Jane A. Munro, "'This Hateful Letter-Writing': Selected Correspondence of Sir Edward Burne-Jones in the Huntington Library", Huntington Library Quarterly 55 (1992). Cf. also V. Schuster, "The Pre-Raphaelites in Oxford," Oxford Art Journal 1 (1978). possibly as a result of this, a great deal of Burne-Jones' influence can be seen in his work — although it could be argued that Burne-Jones also drew ideas from Stanhope's work. The androgynous physiques, Grecian-style draperies and facial expressions depicted in Love and the Maiden are classic Burne-Jones hallmarks, even though the facial similarities probably also arose from use of the same models.T. Hilto, The Pre-Raphelites, Thames and Hudson (1970).
See also English art List of Pre-Raphaelite paintings
References
Further reading Hilto, Timoth, The Pre-Raphelites, Thames and Hudson (1970). Robinson, Michael, The Pre-Raphaelites, Flame Tree Publishing (2007). Todd, Pamela, Pre-Raphaelites at Home, Watson-Giptill Publications, (2001).
External links Art sales: Stanhope's maiden tells a tale article on The Telegraph, 27 January 2003 John Roddam Spencer Stanhope, artist (Victorian Art in Britain) Love and the Maiden on victorianweb.org John Roddam Spencer Stanhope by Lewis Carroll (National Portrait Gallery)