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Our English coasts (strayed sheep): William Holman Hunt.

Paintings by William Holman Hunt (1827-1910) likely provoked an arched eyebrow or two when they first appeared during those Victorian days. His realistic and naturalistic depictions of human foibles were a departure from artistic conventions of the time that tended toward a more classical style. In and out of fashion over time, Hunt’s colorful, detailed paintings often had a moral narrative. Although some of his scenes may have been viewed as a bit impertinent for his era, he would go on to achieve fame worldwide for his beloved work The Light of the World, picturing Christ knocking at a door, bearing a glowing lantern. Born in a district of London, Hunt had a father who himself stuck to the financial stability of work in the textile industry. Dad was less than enthusiastic about his son’s desire to be an artist, believing it to be a sketchy future for him, but Hunt would nonetheless eventually attend the Royal Academy schools. Hunt met John Everett Millais and Dante Gabriel Rossetti, who, along with himself and a few other artists, became part of a group known as the PreRaphaelite Brotherhood, formed in 1848. The group envisioned a more vivid and vigorous art for their future, with less attention to academic tradition. The aims of the Brotherhood were as follows: “1. To have genuine ideas to express; 2. To study Nature attentively, so as to know how to express them; 3. To sympathize with what is direct and serious and heartfelt in previous art, to the exclusion of what is conventional and self-parading and learned by rote; 4. And most indispensable of all, to produce thoroughly good pictures and statues.” (Lochnan K, Jacobi C, ed. Holman Hunt and the PreRaphaelite Vision. Toronto, Canada: Art Gallery of Ontario; 2008:39.) In terms of technique, Hunt harked back to a Renaissance-era (quattrocento) approach, which made use of a thin application of paint on a white background that resulted in luminous color. An example of Hunt’s punchy but moralistic parables is the offbeat but entertaining The Hireling Shepherd, painted in the early 1850s. In Hireling, a young shepherd with apparent amorous intent approaches a woman sitting in a field, leaving his sheep to their own devices. An obvious reading is a warning of a potentially ruinous outcome for the lass, but Hunt’s intended message is thought to be “an attack on churchmen who ignored their primary duties.” (Lochnan, Jacobi, p 101.) Another ovine picture, Our English Coasts (Strayed Sheep), was also painted around this time. In Our English Coasts, sheep of several breeds are gathered in scattered clumps near cliffs of dramatic height. Some of the sheep are alert and vigilant, others more languorous, or even somnolent. Several sheep are drifting away from the herd, such as the inquisitive lamb in the foreground and its umber-toned adherent. One daring denizen is already in harm’s way, enmeshed in underbrush on a slope below. The red blazes on some woolly coats are markings used for purposes such as identification. It is altogether concerning that there is no shepherd in evidence. The realistic representation of the sheep is such that it seems almost possible to run one’s hand over the tufts of wool, which has a degree of definition not unlike that of the lamb in Agnus Dei (Lamb of God) by Francisco de Zurbarán (JAMA cover, April 8, 2009). Coasts was noticed when exhibited in Paris in 1855 at the Exposition Universelle. As commented by Rose, “Hunt’s canvas, painted in the summer and autumn of 1852 in Fairlight, near Hastings, was probably the brightest, most prismatic oil painting to be seen since Turner’s late landscapes. The brilliance of the sun does not, as it was to do in Impressionist work, dissolve the objects it shines on, but emphasizes all their particular qualities: the thin membrane of a sheep’s ear, the translucent wings of the butterflies, the flocked heads of docks and bedstraw.” (Rose A. The PreRaphaelites. London, UK/New York, NY: Phaidon Press; 1977:56.) The Holy Land piqued Hunt’s interest with its possibilities for religiously themed paintings, and he spent much time there. Sadly, when he and wife Fanny were en route to the East in 1866, Fanny died with a fever in Florence, leaving him with a baby son. Hunt would go on to marry Fanny’s sister Edith in Switzerland in the 1870s, which was outré at this time in England (until passage of the Deceased Wife’s Sister’s Marriage Act 1907). Despite these instances of personal anguish, Hunt continued to work (eventually with assistance) even when his eyesight began to fail. In 1905, Hunt received the Order of Merit from King Edward VII. At Hunt’s death in 1910, his ashes resided near those of other esteemed artists in St Paul’s Cathedral. A version of The Light of the World had been presented to the Cathedral in 1908 after being on tour in locations throughout the British Empire. The painting was estimated to have been viewed by millions. Hunt’s personal beliefs had burnished the picture with an enduring light, bringing a message of hope to the world.