SOURCES FOR SIR JOHN EVERETT MILLAIS’S ‘CHRIST IN THE HOUSE OF HIS PARENTS’ BY ALBERT BOIME, © other work by the Pre-Raphaelite \ Brotherhood sparked as much controversy or gained as much notoriety for the group as Millais’s Christ in the House of His Parents (Carpenter's Shop) when it was unveiled at the Royal Academy Exhibition in 1850 (Gg. 1). It touched off a lively but malicious diatribe from Charles Dickens, and ultimately generated Rus- kin’s wild defense of the Pre-Raphaclites.* Devo- tional and symbolic in content but naturalistic in detail, it became a strident manifesto of the Broth- ethood’s aims, and as such remains one of its seminal productions. Against the backdrop of an ordinary dwelling, Millais reconstructed a carpen- ter’s setting reminiscent of contemporary work- shops. His intent was to illustrate in everyday terms the childhood environment of Jesus. Both public and critics, however, objected to the un- idealized conception which depicted St. Joseph asa ‘common artisan at his workbench and the Virgin and St. Anne as the homely members of a laborer’s family. The crowding of several generations into the composition, moreover, suggested the insuffi- cient accommodations and confining atmosphere of the English workingman’s domain. The net result of Millais’s treatment was to flaunt the con- ventional ideal of the Holy Family and violate the Victorian code of propriety. As the critic of The Times expressed it: “Mr. Millais’s ... picture is, to speak plainly, revolting. The attempt to associate the holy family with the meanest details of a carpenter's shop, with no conceivable omission of misery, dirt, of even disease, all finished with the same loathesome minuteness, is disgusting.” ‘The savage attack Millais aroused, and eye- ness testimony to the development of the picture, have somehow combined to prevent the work from being studied for possible sources. While John Rogers Herbert's Our Saviour Subject to His Parents at Nazareth has been mentioned as a “forerunner” of Millais’s work, their obvious differences militate against the suggestion of a direct link (fig. 2).4 Millais’s painting stands as the incontestable invention of a youthful rebel, a notion sustained by the accounts of Millais’s as- sociates and relatives. According to Holman Hunt, the idea of the picture detived from a ser- mon on a biblical text which Millais heard at Oxford during the summer of 1849, and a cou- sin testified that every detail of the work “was discussed by the father, mother, Johnnie (the art- ist) before a touch was placed on canvas, al- though sketches had been made.” The picture was begun in the autumn of the same year; Ros- setti saw a sketch for it in Millais’s studio on 1 November; the heads of the Virgin and Christ2 GAZETTE DES BEAUX-ARTS Fig. 1 — Sm Jou Evenere Miuats. Christin the Hause of His Parents exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1850. Canvas, 34% 55 i London, Tate Gallery. Pet ofthe Museum were béing painted when William Rossetti ex- completed by 8 April, and shown the following amined the picture on 21 February; on 3 March month at the Royal Academy. Millais's family William Millais was observed posing for the and friends thus participated in the entire devel- chest of the apprentice. The work was almost opment of the picture, and their first-hand Fic, 2 — Joux Roceas Hersexr Ow Savion Subject to His Parents at Nazareth, 1847. Oil on canvas. Lon- don, Guildhall Are Gallery. While it has been mentioned as. 2. “forerun net” of Mill's work, their obvious differences militate against the sug: ‘gestion of a direct linkSIR JOHN EVERETT MILLAIS B ‘Macum. la. this preliminary stady, as in the two following ones, the ap. prentice rests his left arm on the hhench and lines up the board by ‘ight. Fig. 4— Muuuass. Study for Christ the Flower of Hit Parent, 1849-1830. Pencil 7!s%15% in. "Cambridge, Fiezwiliam Museum. Phot. of the ‘Maca ic, 4 — Muats. Stody for Cris in (he House of His Parents, 1¥4 Pen and ink and wash,74 GAZETTE DES BEAUX-ARTS reports apparently disinclined scholars to look further for its derivation. Not long after the work was displayed, howev- er, some spectators must have recognized its striking resemblance to an old master painting attributed to Annibale Carracci, The Holy Family in a Carpenter's Shop, exbibited at the British In- stitution in 1851 (fig. 7)“ Known also as Le Raboteur, the painting had passed from the Or- leans collection at the time of the French Revolu- tion to that of the Earl of Suffolk, in whose fami- ly it has since remained.? It shows three figures in the courtyard of a house: in the center and at the left, St. Joseph teaches the child Jesus how to lay out a plank with a cord, and at the right the Virgin sits doing her sewing, looking up mom- entarily from her work. Despite the fact that Mil- lais has set his scene in an interior, the general composition and several specific details of the two works are so close that the parentage cannot be doubted, As in the Annibale, Millais organized his com- position frontally around the workbench, thus creating the unusual oblong format and empha- sizing the one-point perspective scheme. His St. Joseph and apprentice are analogous to the St Joseph and Christ in Annibale’s work, both pairs bending over their project. While in three of the preliminary studies for Millais’s picture, the ap- Prentice résts his left arm on the bench and lines up the board by sight (figs. 5-5), in the final stages he pulls a cord taut, his left hand resem- bling St. Joseph’s right in the Carracei (figs. 6, 1). Obviously, the desire to retain the Carracci motif presented Millais with a difficult problem, since it is unclear in the definitive painting how the other end of the cord is being held in place. ‘The highly finished study at the Tate further in- dicates that Millais had at first thought of depict- ing the Virgin at her sewing basket and this rein- forces the comparison. The location of the basket on the floor next to the hem of the Virgin’s skirt, the type of basket itself and the ball of thread next t0 it are similar in both cases. But the preli- minary sketches are perhaps most revealing in tracing the evolution of the workbench motif. In Miillais’s painting it rests on four heavy uprights and has a thick top, quite at variance from Car- 's design. It is clear, however, from the Fitz- william pencil study and the careful Tate sketch that Millais came close to adopting Carracci’s workbench, which has a much thinner top and sawhorse-type legs canted out from the center. Millais’s first idea demonstrates his difficulty in arriving at a satisfactory form for the table, since it seems to combine the sawhorse legs and the heavy top (fig. 3). It is also worth noting that, although Millais’s scene is set in an interior, like the Carracci, the right side of his picture leads to an inner chamber and the left to a landscape vis- ta, Equally exciting are the scattered wood shav- ings on the floor, the location of the saw in the background, the boards leaning against the wall, and the curious relationship of Millais’s nail and pincers to Carracci’s clamp and hammer on the top of the tables. Both artists delighted in the use of these accessories to build up the atmosphere of the workshop, and Millais’s finical indulgence in the rendering of the shavings attracted a good deal of critical attention. Millais might have known Carracci’s painting in the original, although the last previous record- ed exhibition of the work had been in 1816. Perhaps Woolner, who hailed from Hadleigh in Suffolk, was familiar with the Earl of Suffolk’s collection." Most likely, however, Millais knew the work from a reproduction. On 11 October, 1856 the Raboteur was stolen together with a number of other works from Charleton Park, the seat of the Earl of Suffolk, and the following month a long article devoted to the theft, accom- panied by a wood engraving of Carracci’s work, was published in the Illustrated London News (fig. 7). The article singled out the picture as a first-rate production, praised it as “worthy of the reputation of the great master,” and described it as being “well known to every connoisseur and picture-dealer in the Kingdom.” These remarks, joined to the fact that a reproduction existed, show that the Raboteur had a widespread popu- larity and was known to the public prior to the 1851 showing at the British Institution. Millais was an avid collector of old master engravings, as well as reproductions of contemporary Ger- man artists,!? and it is instructive to compare the ‘Tate sketch with the wood engraving. The clear,SIR JOHN EVERETT MILLAIS a Fic. 6— Muntass. Study for Crist in te Howse of His Parents, 1830. Pen and ink over pencil, 724% 11° i. London, Tate Gallery. Plot. of the Masa. As in te final stage (FG. 1), the apprentice pulls + cord taut, bis left hand resembling St. Joseph's right in the Caeraci (ef. Fic. 7). firm outline—a cardinal quality of Pre-Raphaelite draftsmanship—and the picturesque details of the Millais have a close affinity with the style of the latter. Millais’s study of prints after Joseph Fithrich may have made him susceptible to the reproduction of the Rabofeur, since they share the unaffected simplicity and straightforward sen- timent of quattrocento painting. Millais deviated from the Carracci primarily in his depiction of an interior scene and in the Fig. 7 — Ateibuted to Anwimati Cannaces. The Hedy Family ina Carpenter's Shop (Le Rabotinr). Wood engraving published in the scrated London News, $ November 1836. Millis, might have known Carrels painting in the original, but most likely from a reproduction, greater number of figures he included. In addi- tion, we know that the figure of St. John the Baptist at the extreme right was a last-minute insertion, so that it is not surprising to learn that the artist tapped still another source to aid him in clarifying the final picture.!! For these supple- mentary features Millis drew upon Hippolyte Flandrin’s Prix de Rome composition, Theseus Recognized by his Father (fig. 8). It too shares many qualities with Millais's work: the oblong view of an interior established by the length of a table seen frontally; a dominant horizontal plane around which a number of figures orbit in an elliptical design. In both cases, the central axis is empha- sized by an interior wall member which frames the principal action, and is in turn thrown into relief by flanking rectangular openings leading to the exterior. Several specific parallels also come through: the relationship of St. Anne to ‘Theseus’s father who bends over the table and touches the knife, and that of the bony, sinewy arm of the old man to the limbs of St. Joseph. But the most striking of these is the affinity be- ween the St. John in Millais’s picture, and the servant at the far right in Flandrin’s who enters carrying a basket of food. Although facing in opposite directions, their gestures and composi- tional roles are nearly identical. Millais would certainly have been familiar with Flandrin’s pic-76 GAZETTE DES BEAUX-ARTS ture through Hunt and Rossetti, who had visited Paris in 1849 and made a pilgrimage to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts to see the Prix de Rome composi- tions. They also wrote back enthusiastically about Flandrin, whom they recognized as a spi- ritual confrire.1® But if Millais’s. relationship with Flandrin—the French Pre-Raphaelite—is, understandable, how can we explain his link to Carracci, a representative of one of the traditions Hunt described as “lethal in their influence,” and whose very name by simple definition excluded i from the charmed circle of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood? Indeed, Hunt repeatedly assails the Carracci as the source of all evil in contemporary art, and rejoices when Ruskin reverses Rey- nolds’s order of preference of the Bolognese over the Venetians. A careful reading of these pas- sages, however, reveals that Hunt’s quarrel is not any of the individual Carracci, but with the academic tradition their followers helped estab- lish.1” His many criticisms reflect a contemporary prejudice against the Bolognese influence on the Academy.!® Somewhat naively, he traced the stereotyped compositions and. technical man- nerisms of contemporary academicians to the Bolognese School.!® In a sense, this view can be understood in light of certain Pre-Raphaelite ob- jections to Reynolds who warmly praised the irracci, and it was especially “‘the Carracci” in conventional and symbolic implications that aroused Hunt’s enmity. For all their avowed antagonism to the legacy of “the Carracci” notwithstanding, the Pre Raphaelites must have abided an ambivalent atti tude toward the immediate person of Annibale and his family. The critic Hazlitt, whom they ad- mired, had expressed enthusiastic veneration for Annibale, and celebrated his wholesome in- fluence.» Reynolds made clear Annibale’s fidelity o “the peculiarities of the individual model,”2 and even Ruskin—whose denunciation of the Bolognese influenced Hunt’s attitude—grudging- ly admitted that the Carracci approached nature humbly, although in his view they spent too much time contemplating the seamy side of life.2® Annibale himself was held in high esteem by such disparate figures as Lawrence Turner, Constable? and most surprisingly, by Blake, who, in the attempt to convince his patron ‘Thomas Butts of his own merit, wrote: “I ... also Know & Understand & can assuredly affirm that the works I have done for You are Equal to Carrache or Rafael...”2 Despite a somewhat face- tious tone in Blake’s letter, it is evident that in his mind and that of his public Carracci was the man to beat. Significantly, the sympathetic Opie had recom- mended to his students Annibale’s advice on drawing: “First make a good outline, and then (whatever you do in the middle) it must be a good picture.”®” Millais’s own lucid outlines may have ultimately derived from this outlook, since at Sass’s, where he first received formal training, students were required to copy the outlines of engravings after Carracci® The Pre-Raphaelites could have easily accepted Annibale’s formal clarity, his for reality in all its aspects and his taste for carieature2” As a group they might even have identified with the Carracci academy, Accademia degli Incamminati, which issued from conditions similar to those of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Initially a sort of “family” enter prise directed by Annibale, his brother Agostino and their cousin Lodovieo, the Carracci academy represented a youthful protest against the anti- naturalistic tendencies of late Mannerism.® Like the Pre-Raphaelites, it formed the nexus of an intellectual community, where artists, writers and philosophical thinkers met to exchange ideas. Above all, the Carracci were engrossed in the study of nature and made everyday life the point of departure for theit Academy. The Pre-Raphae- lites could hardly disagree with the Carracci pro- gram: their contempt for its so-called “corrupt- ing” influence was nothing more than a reflec- tion of the common prejudice against the Carrac- ci disciples. Indeed, when confronted directly with a work by Annibale, Hunt’s—and even Ruskin’s—attitude was one of veneration. ‘The Pre-Raphaelite were often at pains to dis- abuse the public of the notion that their outlook was exclusively an affair of quattrocentism, and a disinterested look at the Rabofeur discloses many features entirely compatible with their position. We have already mentioned the unpretentious-JOHN EVERETT MILLAIS 7 HurnoureeFiaspan. These Rergnied by Hie Father, 1852. Canvas, 54% 42. Paris, Beole des Beaux-Arts. Phot. Bulle Flandrin’s Prix de Rome composition shares many qualities with Milais's work ness of Carracci’s treatment: the scene is depicted without conventional trappings, and Christ him- self is presented in a human, plebeian context The workshop iconography must have had a special appeal to the disciples of Ruskin’s arts- and-crafts morality, which became a national obsession when the Great Exhibition was in- augurated in 1851. Carracci’s medieval setting, identified by the Romanesque-type window, and the rendering of a manual laborer plying his trade would have assuredly struck a responsive chord. Asa youth, Hunt’s favorite text in Modern Painters was Ruskin’s discussion of the symbolism of Tintoretto’s Annuciation in the lower hall of the Scuola di San Rocco,,where the author interprets the unused tools and the new building being erected as representing the emergence of Christi anity on the ruins of Judaism. Hunt inferred from the passage that St. Joseph was meant to represent the “new builder,” and he communicated his insight to Millais.** He never forgot the excite- ment of this intellectual experience, and years later he recalled it with the same enthusiasm in the presence of Ruskin before the very work itself. Ic is therefore not unexpected to learn that Rabo- eur influenced Hunt's work as well. He exploited the motif in the vignette at the right of his Finding of Christ in the Temple (fig. 9),® and also as the basis of his later painting, Shadow of Death (fig. 10). As in Millais's Carpenter's Shop, Hunt focused onc. 9 — Waitsas Houstas Hse. Finding of Chriet in the Temple s4-t860, deal, Canvas, Birmingham, City Muscum and Art Gal = Phot. of the Mascam. The Reiter influenced Hunt's wo: wel; he exploited the motif tthe right of the painting the wood shavings and tools—this time, however, as signs of the new dispensation—and like his colleague, intimated the presentiment of anguish the Virgin was condemned to suffer.” Both Millais and Hunt dramatically transform the generalized types of the Raboteur into the photographic likenesses of their family, friends and carefully selected models. Millais’s serupu- lous reconstruction of a contemporary carpent- er’s shop and the verisimilitude of his protagon- ists stand out in stark contrast with the Carracci types. As if to carry the Carracci program to its logical conclusion, Millais strives for the highest level of naturalism imaginable. Not surprisingly, the earliest studies are far more idealized than the final product—the resulting work having been [TE DES BEAUX-ARTS progressively achieved through the various stages of preparatory drawing. Just as Hunt might have employed a Boucher motif for his Hireling Shepherd to contrast the French painter’s “truth,” so tify his use of Carraeci’s in- vention by infusing it with Pre-Raphaelite timent. The Rabofeur was thus transmuted into a Pre-Raphaelite manifesto. Perhaps it was the public’s very familiarity with the Raboteur which predisposed it negatively to Millais’s conception. Yet this cannot wholly explain the intense hostility with which press and public greeted the work: something in the paint- ing touched a nerve center deep in the Victorian consciousness. It is never mentioned as a signifi- cant problem, but the fact that the Pre-Raphae- lites use as models members of their own fami has much to do with the effect their work Fre. 10 W.H. Huse, The Shadow of Death 851% 66 in. Manchester, City Aet Gallery. Phot. ofthe Maron. AS in Mill's Carpenter's Shep, Hunt focused on the wood shavings and tools, and intimated the presentiment of anguish the Virgin ‘was condemned to sulfer. 1870-1873. Canvas,SIR JOHN Fio. 11 — J.B, Muu.ats [2]. Perrit of Mary Holghinon, ca. 1843, Although Mrs. Henry Hodgkinson, the wife of Millas’s half brother, st for Mary, t seems certain that Milli’s mother provided ‘the Viegin’s head (ff 12). creates. The discomfiture they often make us feel is inherent in the self-conscious attitudes of the pictorial protagonists and ultimately to their rela- tionship with the artist and to each other. Mil his’s extensive use of his family, as well as their deep personal involvement in Carpenter's Shop, partially explains the awkward gestures and its sense of constraint. This employment of family members and intimate friends served a two-fold purpose: on the one hand, it guaranteed the natural characterizations their program required, and on the other—pethaps most important of all—it permitted the romantic dream projection Of the artist and his circle into an ideal univer While much Pre-Raphaelite work was negatively charged in its denunciation of the contemporary moral climate, it also had the positive virtue of projecting the painters and their kinsmen in the role of medieval heroes and allowing a vicarious existence in this fantasy world. This called for EVERETT MILLAIS 79 more initiative than the society was willing to tolerate. It was inevitable, moreover, that the fantasy should involve the dynamics of interpersonal relationships. Inherent in Pre-Raphaelitism is the tense psychological drama of familial encount “The Christ in the House of His Parents s.a paradig- matic example: Millais’s father sat for the head of St. Joseph; his cousin Edwin Everett modeled for John the Baptist; and although Mrs. Henry Hodgkinson, the wife of Millais’s half-brother, sat for Mary, it seems certain that Millais’s mother posed for the Virgin’s head. Mrs. Hodgkinson wwas too young for the Virgin’s head, which can be seen from a portrait of 1845 (fig. 11)*" and from the fact that she is the Isabella in Millais’s work of 1849, Lorenzo and Isabella, where the youthful looking damsel accords well with her real-life counterpart. Conversely, a late portrait of Millais’ mother reproduced in his son’s biography, bears a strong resemblance to the Virgin: they share Fig. 12 — Wasa Munias, Portrait of Mary Mills, ca. 1869 She eas a strong resemblance tothe Virgin,80 GAZEITE DES BEAUX-ARTS such features as the long face, high cheek bones, wrinkled brow, thin nose with slightly arched bridge, as well as the slight build—a description which fits the written record (fig. 12)". (Perhaps not fortuitously, Mrs. Millais, who was christened Emily Mary, was called “Mary” at home.) Millais’s brother William posed for the position of the apprentice, but he had previously modeled for John the Baptist in Millais’s painting of 1847 The Widow's Mite, and the artist once remarked to Hunt that William was perfectly “suited” for St. John.!# And while the Christ child was modeled after a friend’s son, it is most probable that he is a projection of Millais himself. ‘The principal difficulty Millais had in the final stages of the painting was related to the heads of the Virgin and Christ; at first she was represented being openly kissed by the child, but finally she was changed to the very ambiguous position of the present picture. These two figures were constantly painted and repainted in various com- binations, and completed only a short time before the picture was exhibited. Their resolution is so unsatisfactory, that critics became entangled in their reading of the motif." The subject of Millais’s picture was based on a verse from Zechariah, which served as its title in the Royal Academy Exhibition of 1850: “And one shall say unto him, what are these wounds in thine hands? Then he shall answer, those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.”*7 As erroneously interpreted by the art- ist, this verse foretells the passion of Christ and his sufferings at the hands of his own people.® Millais illustrates the prophecy by having the young Jesus injure his hand on a nail which pierces the workbench, and showing a drop of blood on Christ’s foot. The mother’s face reflects profound anguish over both her immediate fai- lure to protect the child and her prescience of future events. In an ambiguous and half-hearted gesture, the child makes an effort to assuage her sense of guilt and pain. Meanwhile, the father, in an almost bemused fashion, grabs Christ’s hand from behind and turns it back for closer examina- tion. St. Anne reaches over the table toward the pincers, perhaps to withdraw: the nail, but her face also betrays resignation and sorrow. As he brings water to wash the wound, St. John casts a knowing glance at the entire event.49 In actual life, Millais’s mother played the dom- inant role in the family. The father was some- what ineffectual, and young Millais treated him as a kind of buffoon.'! Mrs. Millais, on the other hand, swayed the household to her wishes, and it was her ambition for her youngest son “John- nie” that brought the family to London and caused the whole family to revolve around him.5? She encouraged his nascent precocity and under- took the greater part of his education. Her ag- gressiveness got him into the Academy at the tender age of eleven, and then she continued to help him win all the available honors. She criti- cized his work, provided him with subjects, and even did research for him at the British Museum. In order to facilitate contact with her son she kept a work-table in his studio, where akin to the Virgin in Raboteur and the preliminary sketches for Carpenter's Shop, she did her crocheting. Thus there can be no doubt as to the major role Mrs. Millais played in her son’s development, and in later years he was quoted as saying, “I owe everything to my mother.”5§ Both mother and son, however, must have had second thoughts about the choice of profession through- out the latter part of 1849 and early 1850. The Lorenzo and Isabella was generally regarded as “a prime joke,” and subjected the young artist to an avalanche of negative criticism.#® Now as he painted Christ in the House of His Parents, deter- mined against his mother’s wishes to proceed along Pre-Raphaelite lines, he must have antici- pated more adverse reaction. Sir Martin Archer Shee, who sponsored Johnnie's entrance in the Academy, told his mother before their interview to make him rather a “chimney sweep” than a painter, and in Millais’s disappointment of the period he may have indeed questioned the w dom of his choice.5? He did not sustain criticism well, and his later career is a testimony to his need for popular acclaim. Millais was also feeling, cramped by his lack of independence in the household, and once before he had closed his parents out of the studio, a gesture which deeply offended his mother. He told Hunt that he ob-SIR JOHN EVERE! jected to the transformation of his studio “into the general sitting-room.” Subjected to the pres- sures of his mother, and frustrated over the reception of his work, Millais projected these feelings in the painting: the dense, claustropho- bie crowd of figures literally “closes in” on the protagonist and is responsible for his wound. At the same time, the artist intimates ultimate triumph by the presence of the dove and the flock of sheep advancing toward the house to receive their shepherd. Curiously, when Mrs. Millais read the reviews of the Carpenter's Shop she denounced them as “blasphemous” insults to the Holy Family, a projection of her own distress and guilt. She tried to blame Rossetti for cor- rupting her son, and attributed the adverse reac- tion to Johnnie’s change in style. Dickens’s irrational response to Millais’s work is directly related to the undisguised depiction of factual people and their personal conflicts in the context of the sacred theme. The obtrusiveness of these features threatened his idealized vision of the Holy Family. As he declared in his attack “You come... to the contemplation of a Holy Family. You will have the goodness to discharge from your minds all Post-Raphael ideas, all reli- gious aspirations, all elevating thoughts; all ten- der, awful, sorrowful, ennobling, sacred, grace- ful, or beautiful associations; and to prepare yourselves, as befits such a subject—Pre-Raphael- ly considered—for the lowest depths of what is mean, odious, repulsive, and revolting.” Ic is not generally known, but in the period immediately prior to Millais's development of Carpenter's Shop, Dickens had been preparing his ‘own version of the life of Christ for his chil- dren A highly glossy, saccharine account, it conspicuously omits all references to the profes- sion of St. Joseph and the young Jesus. Undoubt- edly, Dickens's totally idealized vision has sym- bolic significance in terms of his own childhood. ‘The son of an aspirant to the gentry who could never make ends meet, Dickens was put to work when only eleven years old—ironically, the same age as Millais on entering the Academy War- ren’s blacking warehouse in the Strand. The painful effects of this experience etched them- selves deeply into his counsciousness, and years 81 later the memory haunted him, so much so that he deliberately concealed it from his wife and children. He blamed his parents—and especially s mother, who did not wish him to quit the factory—for having blocked his designs for a classical education and forcing him to chgage early in commercial pursuits. ‘The debilitating consequences of the factory environment and the drudgery to which he was assigned are poignant- ly articulated in this statement: No words can express the secret agony of my soul as 1 sunk. into this companionship; s..and felt my early hopes of growing up to be a learned and distinguished man, crushed in my breast. The deep remembrance of the sense I had of being utterly neglected and hopeles.. cannot be written. My whole nature was s0 penetrated with grief and buniliation of such considerations, that even iow, famous and caressed and happy, I often forget in my dreams that I have a wife and ebildren; even that Lam a man; and wander desolately back to that time of lifes ‘The autobiographical intent of David Copper- field, a work conceived in the same year as Car- ipenter’s Shop, was Dickens's attempt to work out his trauma by absorbing the painful experiences jin an_ idealized context. David Copperfield, blessed with outstanding ability and a sensitive nature, is turned at the age of ten into a “labor- ing hind” in the service of “Murdstone and Grinby’s.” His mother, indirectly responsible for the catastrophe, is never relieved of her burden of guilt, and eventually dies from the cruel treat- ment of the stepfather. But if Dickens permitted a partially disguised form for working out his personal trauma, he could not permit the violation in any form of the sacred boyhood of Jesus. The one perfect child- hood which unfolded according to divine plan was a substitute fulfillment for his unhappy ex- perience. No wonder then, preoccupied by these thoughts, that Dickens reacted so violently to Miillais’s picture, which not only undermined the fantasy of Christ’s juvenescence, but also exposed his own unhealed childhood wounds. In the same way, Millais aroused the wrath of Victorian soci- ety in general, The Victorian ideal of domestic bliss, a vision of a loving family of several gener-82 GAZETTE DES BEAUX-ARTS ations under the same roof, and the sheltered life it implied, found its most suecinet embodiment in the theme of the Holy Family. Millais’s expo- sure of his family’s psychological conflicts in the context of this theme, and the discomfiting un- happiness conveyed by the picture, threatened one of the illusions upon which the Victorian outlook owed its adhesion and moral force. Later, Millais, like Frith and Dickens, decided it was easier satisfying the public than outraging it, and in a short time he became one of the most fashionable painters in Victorian society. But for that brief moment between the formation of the Rise Aucune euvre préraphadlite ne provogua autant de controverses et Brotherhood and his election to the Academy as A.R.A., Millais challenged that society on its most vulnerable level. An astonishing parallel ex- ists between Millais and the French painter Manet: both yearned for official acclaim and re- spected convention, yet their pioneering works outraged the public precisely because of their treatment of traditional themes. However, just as Manet unwittingly provoked fresh insights into the standards of his society, so Millais anticipated not David Copperfield, but Hardy’s Tractarian stonemason, Jude Fawley, AB. fs Le Clrit dans la maisoo de set Parente pat Sir John Everett Milas. ccquit autant de notoriété au «Brotherhood» que Le Christ dans fa maison de ses Parents (L'atelier du Charpentier), lorsqu'on le vit pout la premiéze fois 4.la Royal Academy, en 1850. II suseita une c malveillante de Dickens et amena Ruskin & prendre violemment la défense des préen. phaélites. Son naturalisme serupuleux et le traitement dénué de sentimentalisme de la Sainte Famille violaient le code vietorien de la bienséance. Ce tableau a toujours été considéré comme le manifeste du groupe Curieusement, sa source principale est /e Raboteur, attribué & Annibale Carrache, dans la collection du comte de Suffolk. Ce qui semblerait devoir mettre en question l'aversion déclarée du groupe pour les Carrache, mais une étude plus poussée montre que ce n’étaient pas tant les Carrache eux-mémes qu’ils méprisaient, que leurs disciples qui teansformaient toutes leurs innovations en stéréotypes et en maniéres affectées. En fait, beaucoup d’idées des Carrache furent adoptées par les préraphaélites, Comme ses confréres, Millais eut recours & ses amis et ses proches comme modeles, afin de garantir le naturalisme de son euvre. La réaction absurde de Dickens devant le tableau est lige directement au fait qu'il est clair que ce sont des per- sonnages els, avec tous leurs problémes personnels, qui sont représentés dans le contexte du théme saeté. L."idéal vietorien de la felicité domestique, la vision d’une famille aimante de plusieurs générations réunies sous le méme toit, et la vie protégée {que cela suppose, trouve sa plus parfaite représentation dans le théme de la Sainte Famille. Le fait que Millais ait lassé voir les conflits psychologiques de sa famille dans le contexte de ce theme, et la tristesse déconcertante exprimée pat le tableau, rmenacaient lune des illusions auxquelles la perspective vietorienne devait son union et sa force morale, NOTES. *1 am grateful to Constance-Anne Parker and Christine Buckland for facilitating my research at the Royal Academy library and stimulating my interest in the milieu of the Pre- Raphaelites, Donald Posner, Keith Roberts and John Gil- martin graciously answered queries. I wish also ¢o express gratitude to Joseph Bennett of the State University of New York, Stony Brook, for his generous help on the Dickens material, and to Joseph Lofreddo for photographs. For the reaction, see The Grosvenor Gallery, Ewhibi- tion of the Works of Sir Jobn E. Millis, Bart, R-A., London, 1886, Notes by F.G. SrerHens, pp. 12-16; M.H. Seen MANN Millais and bis Works, Edinburgh and London, 1898, Pp. 26-27, 99-101; J.G. Mitts, The Life and Letters of Sir Jobn Everett Millis, PR.A., New York, 1899, 1, 74-783 W.H. Hunt, Pre-Raphaelitism and the Pre-Raphaelite Brother- ood, London, 1905, 1, 204-206, 216-219; D.S. MacCou, AI Picture that Shocked the 1850s, in. The Listener, 54, 19454 PP. 729-730, 2. C. Dicxrns, Old Lamps for New Ones, in Honsebold Words, 1, June 15, 1850, pp. 265-266; J. Ruskin, Letters t0 The Times, May 13, 30, 1851. While Ruskin did not care for the picture either, he defended the principles which he felt were operative in its genesis as well as other Pre-Raphaelite pictures. See also RUSKIN, Pre-Raphaelite, London, 1851 ‘be Exhibition of the Reyal Academy, in The Times, May 850. 4. See J. Maas, Victorian Painters, New York, 1965, p. 38 5. Hons, op. cit, pp. 194-195 6. Manas, op. it, pp. 76-77 7. Fora record of the picture's development, sce Praera- phaclite Diaries and Letters, ed. W.M. Rosserrt, London, 1900, pp. 225-226, 229, 235, 258, 243, 260, 263, 272,SIR JOHN EVERETT MILLAIS 83 8. See British Institution, Catalogue of Pictures by Halian, Spanish, Flemish, Dutch, French and English Masters, London, 1851, No. 8. Although Wittkower accepts the work as a collaborative effort of Carracci and his pupils, Posner rejects this attribution altogether and consigns it to a fol- lower. R. Wirrgowen, The Drawings of the Carracci in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen at Windsor Caste, Lon- don, 1952, 158, No. 439; D. Possen, Amibale Carracc, London, 1971, I, 166, Note 49. The work was shown at the Royal Academy in 1938: Royal Academy of Arts, Catalogue of the Exhibition of 17tb-Century Art in Exrape, London, 1938, 1, No. 336, II (“Illustrated Catalogue”), 73, and most recently atthe Ranger’s House, Blackheath. See K. Rowers Loudon, in Burlingion Magazine, 117, February 1975, p- 135 and fig. 71. For the sake of convenience we shall refer to the picture by its traditional attribution. 9. W. BUCHANAN, Memoirs of Painting, With a Chronologi- cal History of the Importation of Pictures by the Great Masters into England Since the French Revolution, London, 1824, 1, 21, 79. The painting is now in the possession of the’ Hon Mr. and Mrs. Greville Howard, Suffolk 10. Royal Academy of Arts, No. 336. 1A. Woouer, Thomas Woolner, Poet, London, 1917, P. 1 12, The Hlustrated Loudon News, vol. 29, November 8, 1856, p. 475. 13, HUNT, op. cit, p. 1305 MILLAIS, op. ct, pp. 30-51 tg. MILLAls, op. ef, p. 78 15. Hunt, op ct, po 189. 16, Ibid., p. 188; Letters of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, ed. O. Dovorry and J.W. Wari, Oxford, 1965, 1, 66. Hunt wrote that Flandrin's paintings in St-Germain-des-Prés “were undoubtedly the highest examples of religious art of the day,” while Rossetti gushed that che French artist had executed “the most perfect works” that he and Hunt had 17, Howe, op. cit, p. 137, Hl 491; 1, 9t5 and especially 1 49. 18, Ukimately, Fuseli was responsible for it See D. Manon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, London, 1947, pp. 216-217; H. Fuses, Lectures on Painting, London, 1801, pp. fo-82. It must be emphasized, however, that his view. point represented only one shade of opinion, especially with respect to Annibale. See BUCHANAN, op. ci pp. 3, 76 ff.; notes 22-50 below. Also Wirrkowsn, Imitation, Eclectic ism, and Genins, in. Aspects of the Eighteenth Century, ed. E.R. Wasserman, Baltimore, 1965, pp. 150-131, Note 88 19. Hor, I, 83 ff, 88, Note 1. 20, W. Hazurrr, The Complete Works, ed. P.P. Howe, London and Toronto, 1930 ef se9., XVII, pp. 12, 39, 85, ge. Hazlite wrote in one place that a certain expression reminded him of Annibale’s style, “and we are always glad to be reminded of him.” Hunt put Hazlitt on a par with Ruskin, Huw, op. ci, Tl, 450 21. Sir Joshua Revwoups, Discourses on Art, ed. R.R. Wark, San Marino, 1959, p. 20. 22. J. Ruskin, Works, ed. ET. Cook and A. Wedder- burn, London, 1903 ef 19., IV (Modern Painting, I, 1846), R.A., Sculptor and 18g. Ruskin, however, felt that the Carracci and their fol- lowers were “art weeds” on the Venetian tradition. Tbid., pp: XXXV, 254. Note (referring to Leigh Hunt's criticism); V (Modern Painting, I, 1856), 4003 VILL (The Seven Lamps of Architecture, 1849), 207-208, 151. Here he dectied the Carracci’s fidelity to natural drapery effects as “base”. 23. A. Cunnincnam, The Lines of the Most Eminent Brit ish Painters, London, 1880, Ill, p. 78. a4 Ac], Finency, The Life of JAM. Oxford, 1961, p. 230. 25. GR, Lists, Memoirs of the Life of Jobn Constable, London, 1951, pp. #0, 107, 294-295- 26, William Buaxe, Poetry and Prose, ed. D.V. Exdman, New York, 1970, p. 690. Letter to Thomas Butts, Novem ber 22, 1802. The ambivalence of the Pre-Raphaclites toward’ the Carracci is evident from this observation on Blake's remarks by William Rossetti: “OF course many of us at the present day will think that Blake's works are more than equal (in various regards, including some of the highest) t0 those of the Carracci; whom, indeed, Blake himself did not greatly reverence, though he here couples their name with Raphael's. This was probably an argumer- ‘un ad bominem.” See W.M. Rosser, The Poetical Works of Willan Blake, London, 1891, p. Lxx1t, note 2. This work was first published in 1874 27. J. Orte, Lecares on Painting, London, 1809, pp. 23, 133. Opie also praised the Carracei’s ecleetie program and ‘expressed general enthusiasm for their methods. Zbid., pp. 15-16. 28. W.P. Farm, My Antobiegraphy and Reminiscences, London, 1887-1888, I, 37. Naturally, the entire academic tradition stressed outline drawing, but my main point is that Millais would have been sympathetic to this element of his training. He generally prepared elaborate pen-drawn cartoons for his pictures. See H. Hunpano, Some Victorian Draughtamen, Cambridge, 1944, P. 23- 29. Rossetti collected the Work of the French carieatur- ists whom he greatly admired, including Gavarni, Daumier, ‘Cham and Grandville. See Letters, op. it, pp- 31, 23°24, 27 Both Millis and Hunt made caricatures, partly as an off shoot of their interest in book illustration and graphic design. For the involvement of the Pre-Raphaelites in book illustration, see T.S.R, BOast, English Art, 1800-1870, Ox- ford, 1939, pp. 287 fl. They could have read about this aspect of Annibale’s contribution in Lanzi’s work, an edi- tion of which appeared in London in 1847: L. Lanzt, The History of Painting in Italy, London, 1847, Il, 79 30. LAN, op. city p. 68; MAHON, op. ity pp. 198 ffs POSNER, op its pp. 56, 62 ff 31. POSNER, op. it PP. 65-64 32. Host, op. cit, Il, p. 2573 Ruskin, Works, XI, pp. 456, 467-468. In his notes of the 1840's, Ruskin praised ‘Annibale’s landscape technique as wel as specific pictures 33. There is a similar composition by the Ferrarese painter and contemporary of Carracci, Lo Scarsellino, en- titled Sacra Famiglia af lavoro, and presently in Dresden. St. Joseph is shown Kneeling on the table sawing a plank, ‘hile the young Jesus works at his side under the watchful Turner, RAs84 GAZETTE DES BEAUX-ARTS eye of the Virgin. The table, however, differs from the ‘Carracci picture in its diagonal disposition. For a reproduc- ion of this work, see M.A. Nove, La Searsllino, Milan, 1964, No. 25, fig. 18. 1am grateful to Professor Posner for having brought this example to my attention. The early Pre-Raphaelite “do-it-yourself” outlook is discussed in Hor, op. city 1, 151, 208, Il, 406. 34. lid. 1, 903 RUsxin, Works, IV, 264-265. 35. How, op cit I, pp. 260 ff 36. Walker Art Gallery, William Holmav Hint 1827-1910, Liverpool, 1969, No. 51 37. Hun, of. cit. Il, pp. 273 ff. In his Trinmph of the Innocents, Huint used Carracei’s saw for the type carried by St. Joseph. Hunt personally was fascinated by the theme of the carpenter (Ibid, p. 33), and like Millas, sketched the details from actual carpenter shops. See Walker Art Gale lery, op ct, Nos. 45-46. 38. Mary Bennett organized the studies in the following order: 1) the Victoria and Albert sketch, 2) the Fitzwilliam pencil study, 3) the Tate pen and ink drawing, 4) the Tate study of the separate figures. See Walker Art Gallery, John Everett Millis 1826-1696, Liverpool, 1967, Nos. 253-255 39. J.D. MacMutan, Holman —-Hant's —*Hireling Stepherd”*: Some Reflections on a Victorion Pastoral, in Art Ballet, 54,1972. 191 4o. It may not be coincidental that Millais's Lorenzo and Isabella of x849 displays thirteen figures, exaetly one over the number stipulated by Annibale for figure composi- tions—a convention supported by Reynolds. See Discourses, op. tity p. 6 and note. 41, Muntats op cts p. 785 and p. 26. 42, Ibid., p. 5; HUNT, op. cit 1, ps 59. Although the portrait dates from the late 1860's, it still bears a striking resemblance to the Mary in the Carpenter's Shop. 443. Mrs. Hodgkinson’s forename was also Mary, but she ‘was familiar to Millis by her family name. 44: Praeraphaclte Diaries and Letters, op. tity, p. 3633 HONt, op. cit p62. 45. MiLLAts, op. cit ps 78 ‘The sketches, however, reveal no ambiguity, and Ford Madox Hueffer suggests that the change was'brought about by friends who were outraged by what they took to signify adoration of the Virgin. See F.M. Husrrer, The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherbood, London, n.d.,p. 115 46. Curiously, both Millais and Hueffer erroneously as serted that the final work shows the “mother kissing her on.” MILLAts, op ct P. 78; HUEFFER, of. il» Ps 113 47. Zechariah xt, 6, The entire book of Zechariah is a rich compendium of metaphors for building, carpentry and reconstruction, 48. A close reading of the context of the passage shows that it deals not with the Messiah but with false prophets ‘who wish to coneeal their identity. The false prophet repu- diates his profession when it is no longer fashionable, and provides an excuse for wounds which were probably’ self inflicted in a situal ceremony. Edward Morris demonstrated that 's inaccurate interpretation was influenced by Pusey and the Oxford Movement, and could ultimately be traced 0 the medieval mystic, Rupert of Deutz. See E. Monnis, The Subject of Millais’s “Christ in the House of His Parents”, in Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vol. XXXIil, 1970, pp. 343 ff. It should not be over: looked, however, that Zechariah does contain a passage of messianic portent relevant to Millas's picture, XII, 10, cited in John XIX, 37: “They shall look upon ‘me whom they have pierced.” 49. For the symbolism of this picture see Grosvenor Gallery, 14-15; Spielmann, 99-100. Also the more recent study of the work in the context of Anglican Higgh Church influences: A. Grieve, The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and ‘the Anglican High Church, in. Burlingion Magazin, 10%, 1969, PP. 294-295 50. R, WarKINson, Pre-Raphaelite Art and Design, Greenwich, Conn., 1970, P- 44 51. Hoxt, op. cit 1, pp. 61, 92593. 52, WATKINSON, op. Cis, Ped 53. MILLAIS, op. cit pe $4. Hust, 9p et, pp. 58,60, 55. MILLAIS, op. cfs Pe 5 36, Ibid, p. 75 57. Ibid, p. 12. Not fortuitously, Mary Millas recalled Shee's remark while reading the feviews of Carpenter's Shop. Hun, op cit, p. 217 $8, Hor, op. ct, pp. Bo-815 59. Dickens, op. cit p. 265 60. Dickens, The Life of Our Lord, New York, 1934. It was originally written during the years 1846-1849, but withheld from publication because of its personal intent. ‘The manuscript was ultimately bequeathed to Sir Henry Fielding Dickens with the admonition that it should not be published while any chilel of Dickens lived. Sir Henry's widow and children, however, were not bound by this will and permitted its publication. Ivid., pp. 3 ff. 1 am grateful to Professor Joseph Bennett for bringing this work to my G1. J. Fonsten, The Life of Charks Dickens, London, 1948-50, 1, 19 (62. Ibid, pp. 21, 323 E. Jonson, Charles Dickens: His Tragedy and Trinmph, New York, 1952, 1, 32°35, 4445, 65. Fonsre, op. ct. pp. 28-35 64, See J.F.C. HaRnison, The Vietréan Gaspel of Success, in Victorian Studies, vol. 1, 1957-1988, pp. 159-160. 815. 2185p. 219