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Lot Essay
This fine drawing is for the figure of Bacchus seated at the right-hand end of the table in The Feast of Peleus (Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery). A small and highly-finished work, the picture is illustrated in S. Wildman and J. Christian, Edward Burne-Jones: Victorian Artist-Dreamer, Metropolitan Museum, New York, 1998, p. 153.
Stylistically, the drawing can be dated to the early 1870s, which is consistent with what we know of the picture's development. Designed in 1870 for the predella of the so-called Troy triptych, a project never completed in its entirety, it was begun in 1872, worked on in 1874, 1875 and 1879, but only completed in 1881. It was exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery (Summer Exhibition, no. 157) the following year, having been sold to William Graham, the wealthy businessman and Liberal M.P. for Glasgow who was Burne-Jones's staunchest patron.
A much larger version of the painting, begun in 1881 and almost entirely by studio assistants, is in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (see M. Harrison and B. Waters, Burne-Jones, London, 1973, p. 118, pl. 170).
Stylistically, the drawing can be dated to the early 1870s, which is consistent with what we know of the picture's development. Designed in 1870 for the predella of the so-called Troy triptych, a project never completed in its entirety, it was begun in 1872, worked on in 1874, 1875 and 1879, but only completed in 1881. It was exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery (Summer Exhibition, no. 157) the following year, having been sold to William Graham, the wealthy businessman and Liberal M.P. for Glasgow who was Burne-Jones's staunchest patron.
A much larger version of the painting, begun in 1881 and almost entirely by studio assistants, is in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (see M. Harrison and B. Waters, Burne-Jones, London, 1973, p. 118, pl. 170).
