This carefully finished pencil drawing is one of a number of studies for a series of seven paintings illustrating the legend of St. George, patron saint of England. The series was commissioned to decorate the house of artist Miles Birkett Foster at Witley in Surrey. The painting to which this drawing relates is now in the Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, while others are in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, the Forbes Collection in New York, and the Bristol Art Gallery.
The precisely observed but crisply stylized treatment of the foreground foliage and the background trees show the influence of Gabriel Dante Rosetti and other painters of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Such highly worked preparatory drawings were useful to Burne-Jones, who often employed assistants to help him on larger schemes. The image of the dragon is inspired by a XVI-century German woodcut, probably from the collection of the British Museum.
From England, c. AD 1865.
Ht. 35,1 cm.
Bequeathed by Cecil French.
The precisely observed but crisply stylized treatment of the foreground foliage and the background trees show the influence of Gabriel Dante Rosetti and other painters of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Such highly worked preparatory drawings were useful to Burne-Jones, who often employed assistants to help him on larger schemes. The image of the dragon is inspired by a XVI-century German woodcut, probably from the collection of the British Museum.
From England, c. AD 1865.
Ht. 35,1 cm.
Bequeathed by Cecil French.