William Stott of Oldham
Ophelia, Victorian 19th Century Royal Academy Oil Painting

About the Item

Oil on canvas, signed lower right Image size: 33 1/2 x 56 1/2 inches (85 x 143 cm) Original gilt frame Provenance With the artist's son, Millie Dow Stott Esq., until 1912. Artist's Studio Sale, Christies, November 1913. Private Collection Exhibitions London, Royal Academy, 1895, no. 679. Paris, Societe de la Nationale des Beaux-Arts, 1896, no. 1179. Berlin, VII Internationale Kunstausstellung 1897. no. 3533. Manchester, City of Manchester Art Gallery, 1912, no. 339. In the 1890s William Stott exhibited regularly at the Royal Academy, mainly highly decorative works with subjects derived from classical mythology and literature. This painting was Stott's 1895 entry to the Royal Academy and was subsequently exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1896 and then on to the Berlin, VII Internationale Kunstausstellung 1897. Shakespeare was a favourite source for Victorian painters, and the tragic romance of Ophelia, from Hamlet, was an especially popular subject, featuring regularly in the Royal Academy exhibitions. The most popular and iconic image of Ophelia's death was, and is to this day, John Everett Millais's 1851 painting showing the confused and tragic Ophelia floating downstream on her back in a state of mad ecstasy, arms raised in a gesture of inevitable submission. However, although Stott chose not to pastiche this image, it seems highly likely that he was prompted to take up this subject, which had almost become a 'rite of passage' among Victorian painters, by the fact that in 1894 Millais's Ophelia was presented to the National Gallery of British Art by Sir Henry Tate. It appears that Stott was much influenced by John William Waterhouse's version of the event, painted in 1889. Here, Ophelia is lying in a field of wildflowers her right arm outstretched along the ground, her left arm raised above her head. The top of her torso is twisted towards the viewer, whom she looks at with a confused stare. The similarities in the pose between Stott's portrayal and Waterhouse's 1889 version are striking, but in Stott's picture Ophelia is lying on her side on the bank of the stream and her fingertips are immersed in the water. Where Stott references back to Millais' iconic 1851 representation of the tragedy is in his meticulous and painstaking execution of the surrounding foliage and flora. In this depiction of Ophelia one can see the painstaking care that has been given to every leaf, every frond and every flower, illustrating Stott's obsession with subordinating the human presence to a mere detail within the harmony of nature.

Creator:

William Stott of Oldham (1857 - 1900)

Dimensions:

Height: 33.5 in (85.09 cm)Width: 56.5 in (143.51 cm)

More Editions & Sizes:

1 of 1Price: $124,537

Medium:

Oil,Canvas

Movement & Style:

Victorian

Period:

Late 19th Century