The Wheel of Fortune (Burne-Jones)

Last updated

Edward Burne-Jones, The Wheel of Fortune, 1875-1883, Musee d'Orsay Edward Burne-Jones - La ruota della fortuna, 1875-83.jpg
Edward Burne-Jones, The Wheel of Fortune, 1875–1883, Musée d'Orsay

The Wheel of Fortune is an oil painting on canvas by the British Pre-Raphaelite painter Edward Burne-Jones, made from 1875 to 1883. The painting combines classical and medieval themes to present an allegory of the vagaries of life, a vanitas , with individual lives elevated or cast down as the wheel of fortune turns. Burne-Jones commented: "My wheel of Fortune is a true-to-life image; it comes to fetch each of us in turn, then it crushes us." The prime version has been in the collection of the Musée d'Orsay in Paris since 1980.

Contents

Prime version

The painting measures 200 cm × 100 cm (79 in × 39 in), with its frame, 259 cm × 151.5 cm (102.0 in × 59.6 in). It employs a dull palette of greys, browns, greens and blues. It was originally conceived as part of the predella for an unrealised triptych on the Fall of Troy.

The tall frame is filled by a gigantic spoked wooden wheel, turned by a giant personification of the goddess Fortune standing in a contrapposto position, wrapped in the voluminous folds of a metallic blue classical gown, head swathed in a matching cloth, with closed eyes cast down. Three smaller male nudes are being carried around by the wheel: at the top, a slave standing on the head of the second, a king with a crown and sceptre, and at the bottom the head and shoulders of a poet with laurel wreath, looking towards Fortune's feet. The nude male figures were influenced by Michelangelo's paintings at the Sistine Chapel. The wheel and the figures fill most of the composition, but fragments of a wall and a tree can be seen in the top left, with a small patch of grey sky.

The completed painting was exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery in London in 1883, and acquired that year by the politician Arthur Balfour, who later served as British Prime Minister and was created 1st Earl of Balfour in 1922. It was exhibited at the Royal Jubilee Exhibition in Manchester in 1887, the Brussels International Exposition in 1897 and at a Burne-Jones exhibition at the New Gallery in London in 1898.

After Balfour's death in 1930, it was inherited by his brother, Gerald Balfour, 2nd Earl of Balfour, and sold in 1932 to the vicomte Charles de Noailles, who gave it to his daughter Nathalie de Noailles. It was acquired by the French state in 1980, and allocated to the Musée d'Orsay in Paris.

Other versions

A second, smaller version in oils on canvas, painted from 1871 to 1885, is in the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, Australia. Measuring 151.4 cm × 72.5 cm (59.6 in × 28.5 in), it was acquired as part of the Felton Bequest in 1909. It is displayed in a heavy gilded tabernacle-style frame, a modern reconstruction based on fragments of the original, which has a decorative frieze with candelabrum ornament and egg and dart outer border, similar to those of other Burne-Jones paintings such as his Vespertina Quies (1893) in Tate Britain.

National Museum Cardiff has an unfinished version from about 1882, and preparatory sketches are in the Lady Lever Art Gallery.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Berthe Morisot</span> 19th-century French artist

Berthe Marie Pauline Morisot was a French painter and a member of the circle of painters in Paris who became known as the Impressionists.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frédéric Bazille</span> French painter

Jean Frédéric Bazille was a French Impressionist painter. Many of Bazille's major works are examples of figure painting in which he placed the subject figure within a landscape painted en plein air.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pointillism</span> Technique of painting with small, distinct dots

Pointillism is a technique of painting in which small, distinct dots of color are applied in patterns to form an image.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edward Burne-Jones</span> English artist (1833–1898)

Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1st Baronet, was a British painter and designer associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood which included Dante Gabriel Rossetti, John Millais, Ford Madox Brown and William Holman Hunt. Burne-Jones worked with William Morris as a founding partner in Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co in the design of decorative arts.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marie Laurencin</span> French painter, poet and printmaker

Marie Laurencin was a French painter and printmaker. She became an important figure in the Parisian avant-garde as a member of the Cubists associated with the Section d'Or.

<i>LOrigine du monde</i> Oil-on-canvas painted by Gustave Courbet

L'Origine du monde is a picture painted in oil on canvas by the French artist Gustave Courbet in 1866. It is a close-up view of the vulva and abdomen of a naked woman, lying on a bed with legs spread.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eugène Carrière</span> French painter

Eugène Anatole Carrière was a French Symbolist artist of the fin-de-siècle period. Carrière's paintings are best known for their near-monochrome brown palette and their ethereal, dreamlike quality. He was a close friend of Auguste Rodin and his work likely influenced Pablo Picasso's Blue Period. He was also associated with such writers as Paul Verlaine, Stéphane Mallarmé and Charles Morice.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Annie Swynnerton</span> English painter

Annie Louisa Swynnerton, ARA was a British painter best known for her portrait and symbolist works. She studied at Manchester School of Art and at the Académie Julian, before basing herself in the artistic community in Rome with her husband, the monumental sculptor Joseph Swynnerton. Swynnerton was influenced by George Frederic Watts and Sir Edward Burne-Jones. John Singer Sargent appreciated her work and helped her to become the first elected woman member at the Royal Academy of Arts in 1922. Swynnerton painted portraits of Henry James and Millicent Fawcett. Her main public collection of works are in Manchester Art Gallery, but individual works are also held in a few other English cities, as well as can also be seen in Glasgow, Dublin, Paris, and two in Melbourne, Australia. Annie was a close friend of leading suffragists of the day, notably the Pankhurst family.

<i>The Last Sleep of Arthur in Avalon</i> Burne-Joness magnum opus

The Last Sleep of Arthur in Avalon is a painting by Edward Burne-Jones, started in 1881. The massive painting measures 279 cm × 650 cm, and is widely considered to be Burne-Jones's magnum opus.

<i>Adoration of the Magi</i> (tapestry) Tapestry pattern called The Adoration

The Adoration of the Magi is a Morris & Co. tapestry depicting the story in Christianity of the Three Kings who were guided to the birthplace of Jesus by the star of Bethlehem. It is sometimes called The Star of Bethlehem or simply The Adoration.

<i>Sponsa de Libano</i> 1891 painting by Edward Burne-Jones

Sponsa de Libano is a painting by the Pre-Raphaelite artist Edward Burne-Jones dated 1891.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maria Zambaco</span> British artist and model of Greek descent (1843-1914)

Maria Zambaco, born Marie Terpsithea Cassavetti, was a British artist's model of Greek descent, favoured by the Pre-Raphaelites. She was also a sculptor.

<i>King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid</i> (painting) Painting by Edward Burne-Jones

King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid is an 1884 painting by the Pre-Raphaelite artist Edward Burne-Jones. The painting illustrates the story of 'The King and the Beggar-maid", which tells the legend of the prince Cophetua who fell in love at first sight with the beggar Penelophon. The tale was familiar to Burne-Jones through an Elizabethan ballad published in Bishop Thomas Percy's 1765 Reliques of Ancient English Poetry and the sixteen-line poem The Beggar Maid by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

<i>The Card Players</i> Painting series by Paul Cézanne

The Card Players is a series of oil paintings by the French Post-Impressionist artist Paul Cézanne. Painted during Cézanne's final period in the early 1890s, there are five paintings in the series. The versions vary in size, the number of players, and the setting in which the game takes place. Cézanne also completed numerous drawings and studies in preparation for The Card Players series.

<i>The Golden Stairs</i> Painting by Edward Burne-Jones

The Golden Stairs is one of the best-known paintings by the Pre-Raphaelite artist Edward Burne-Jones. It was begun in 1876 and exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery in 1880.

<i>The Circus</i> (Seurat) Painting by Georges Seurat

The Circus is an oil on canvas painting by Georges Seurat. It was his last painting, made in a Neo-Impressionist style in 1890–91, and remained unfinished at his death in March 1891. The painting is located at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris.

<i>The Mill</i> (Burne-Jones painting) Painting by Edward Burne-Jones

The Mill is an Aesthetic Movement, Renaissance-inspired oil on canvas painting completed by Edward Burne-Jones in 1882. The painting's main feature is three women dancing in front of a mill pond on a summer evening, with a vague wooded landscape spanning the background. The Mill is an oil on canvas painting. It is 91 centimetres (36 in) in height, and 197 centimetres (78 in) in width.

<i>A Session of the Painting Jury</i> 1885 painting by Henri Gervex

A Session of the Painting Jury is an oil on canvas painting by the French artist Henri Gervex, probably from c. 1883. The painting, a piece of official art during the Third Republic, shows a meeting of the painting jury of the Salon, the official exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts, in 1883.

<i>Love Among the Ruins</i> (Burne-Jones) Painting by Edward Burne-Jones

Love Among the Ruins is a painting by English artist Edward Burne-Jones which exists in two versions, a watercolour completed in 1873 and an oil painting completed in 1894. It depicts a man and a woman amid ruined architecture. The work is a synthesis of influences from the Pre-Raphaelite, Symbolist and Aesthetic art movements. The ambiguous scene without a clear narrative is considered one of Burne-Jones' best works.

References