The Beloved (oil)
Alternately titled: The Bride (oil)
Alternately titled: The King's Daughter (oil)
Dante Gabriel Rossetti
1865-1866
Physical Description
Medium: oil on panel
Dimensions: 32 1/2 x 30 in.
Signature: monogram
Date on Image: 1865-66
Note: The monogram and date are inscribed at lower left.
Production Description
Production Date: 1865-1866
Exhibition History: Arudnel Club February 21, 1866; R.A., 1883 (no.297); Walker Art Gallery,
Liverpool,
Grand Loan Exhibition, 1886 (no.843); Manchester,
Royal Jubilee Exhibition, 1887 (no.700); R.A., Winter 1906 (no.117); R.A., 1973
(no.319); Tate 1984 (no.133)
Patron: George Rae
Original Cost: £300
Model: Marie Ford
Note: Marie Ford (wrongly called Miss Mackenzie by WMR) sat for the Bride.
Model: Ellen Smith
Note: The bridesmaid in the left foreground is Ellen Smith.
Model: Little mulatto girl
Note: A mulatto girl, who appears in some of the sketches for this work, was eventually replaced
by the little negro boy during the painting of the picture.
Model: Keomi
Note: The model for the figure on the right was Keomi, a gypsy, and paramour of Fredric
Sandys.
Repainting: 1873
The painting was retouched in 1873, a repainting operation that including the replacement
of the foremost figure, a brown mulatto girl, with a little negro boy.
Provenance
Current Location: Tate Gallery
Catalog Number: 3053
Archival History: George Rae; Tate 1916
Electronic Archive Edition: 1
File Name:
sa268.s182.rap.xml
Scholarly Commentary
Introduction
This is the original oil, completed in 1866. Rossetti substantially modified the painting in 1873, work that concluded with the finished oil now displayed at the Tate. No reproduction of this original state is known to exist; however, Rossetti commissioned a photograph of the work while repainting was underway.
Bibliography