Ford Madox Brown v. 1 & 2 A Catalogue Raisonne Mary Bennett

Ford Madox Brown (1821-1893) is known predominantly for his close association, from 1848, with the "Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood" and for his masterpiece, "The Last of England" (1852-5), with its poignant imagery of a young emigrant couple aboard ship taking their last sight of home - portraits of the artist himself and his wife. This fully illustrated catalogue provides the first complete coverage of all of Madox Brown's work.

Madox Brown's early works were admired by the young Dante Gabriel Rossetti, through whom he came into contact with the artists of the "Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood". This association was to confirm his own interests and experiments in outdoor light effects and led to the glowing palette of his great paintings of the 1850s: "Work", "An English Autumn Afternoon" and "The Last of England". His interests also embraced decorative design and in the 1860s he was a founder member of the now famous decorating firm of Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co.

All aspects of his documented work, extant or now lost-sight-of, are presented in this magnificent catalogue, which includes a section on Madox Brown's frame designs (by Lynn Roberts). The artist's diary and his largely unpublished correspondence with associates and patrons provide a fascinating insight into his ideas and plan of work. A tour de force of scholarship, this book will be of immense value to scholars of nineteenth-century British art.

Mary Bennett was Keeper of British Art at the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool. She originated three exhibitions in the 1960s on Ford Madox Brown, John Everett Millais and William Holman Hunt, creating the present-day interest in the Pre-Raphaelite circle.

"Mary Bennett’s scholarly catalogue raisonne of the works of Ford Madox Brown is a source of unalloyed pleasure…Bennett’s superbly researched work is indispensable to anyone interested in the life and work of Brown…. Both Mary Bennett and Yale University Press are much to be congratulated on these two stunningly illustrated volumes." -Henrietta Garnett, Literary Review

"Magnificently designed by Guilland Sutherland and produced to Yale’s customary high standard." -Jan Marsh, Times Literary Supplement

"Like many nineteenth-century men Ford Madox Brown believed in the importance of labour…..He would certainly have admired the labour that Mary Bennett has put into her catalogue raisonné of his works. It is the culmination of over half a century of research … Bennett’s long-awaited catalogue raisonné is a superb scholarly addition."—Laura MacCulloch, Burlington Magazine

"Mary Bennett, who was not afraid to emulate her subject’s preference for a lengthy gestation, spent nearly four times as long on this catalogue as Madox Brown did on Work; the result is no less epoch-making and sets a new benchmark for scholarship of this type."—Timothy Wilcox, Apollo

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