Tuesday, 15 January 2008

Millais at Tate Britain

Went to see the Millais exhibition at Tate Britain on Saturday. Really enjoyed Sir John’s Pre-Raphaelite work which – obviously – is much more vivid and arresting when you see the originals.

Ophelia is magnificent and the detail in the plants was a revelation. It’s such a beautiful, still image of something so tragic.

Conversely Millais’s ‘fancy’ pictures were appalling chocolate-box sentimentality, the most famous being the Pear’s soap advert, Bubbles. Hard to believe it’s the same painter.

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