Ulysses and the Sirens, 1891

"It is not mere fancy to ascribe the character and strength of Waterhouse's art to the fact that he was born in Rome, emerging thereby into a stream which had flowed for over two thousand years and brought with it the myths and legenda of the Greeks; and it was to Italy that he continually returned for refreshment." Hobson, J. W. Waterhouse.

William Waterhouse would, next to other great English Victorian Classicists, find his inspiration in the tales and myths of the ancient world (particularly Greece and Rome), before turning his later attention to the world of Arthurian mythology. His popularity, unlike others in this School, has endured for over a century and his works may now be found all over the Web.

EARLY CAREER

Born in Rome in 1849 to parents who were both successful painters, Waterhouse lived there until age 6, when his family returned to England; he was ever thereafter called "Nino" (short for Giannino)by his family. This early love of the colors and subjects of the antique world threads through his paintings to the end of his life.

Unlike Alma-Tadema, his great contemporary who studied for years with well-known artists, Waterhouse was taught largely by his own father, William, a Yorkshireman with his own successful studio. A working apprenticeship in his father's studio later led to his entry to the Royal Academy Schools. Ironically, his first drawing, required for admission, was rejected; he then prepared a clay sculpture and was admitted, not into the painting school, but into the Sculpture School in 1870, aged 21.

For the next five years, Waterhouse (using his sister as a model) made modest but significant progress both in technical skills and in showings for the Society of British Artists. One of his larger young successes was La Fileuse(1874), with its charming Graeco-Roman setting. Still a student at the Academy School (which required a seven-year tenure), Waterhouse was already regularly selling his paintings to private collectors although still in school.

A prominent gallery showing in 1874, included Waterhouse's In the Peristyle [a young girl in Roman dress feeding pigeons, above], showing that he was already influenced by Larence Alma-Tadema. Alma-Tadema, who had recently come to London with a European reputation in 1870, was already widely copied by young artists. Alma-Tadema's "...careful research and his rendering of marble surfaces and architectural interiors with their figures in classical dress..." reflected the fascination with subjects set in Rome and Greece which was becoming a significant trend in European painting. From the first, Waterhouse's work was contrasted favorably with Alma-Tadema's in terms of the character and dynamic tension of his subjects.

Throughout his 20's, Waterhouse regularly traveled back to Italy. "...he returned to Rome, to stories and events of the past, and to a world of mysteries which all his life he contrived to flesh out in forms somehow as tangible and certainly more warm-blooded than the sculpture of the Greeks, from whose legends the Romans largely derived their own religion and mythology."

His almost-life-sized painting, A Sick Child Brought into the Temple of Asculapius,received critical praise when exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1877. The next year, The Remorse of the Emperor Nero after the Murder of his Mother" (1878)enlarged Waterhouse's reputation as a portraitist not only of classical themes but of three-dimensional individuals. His growing success led him, in the mid-1880's, to draw away from the train of the master, Alma-Tadema, although one of his purest historical paintings, The Favourites of the Emperor Honorius, is also one of his best.

The Favourites of the Emperor Honorius

While the Empire falls to pieces about him, the lacklustre Honorius ignores his frantic generals and scribes and the business of Rome to feed his pet birds, indifferent to the surrounding chaos which will, in a few years, lead to the sack of Rome. The painting showed Waterhouse's mastery of technique, color, and composition, and also his deep commitment to portraying character.

A CAREER IN MATURITY

By the next year 1884,Waterhouse consolidated his reputation with Consulting the Oracle, another large-scale classical work; his St. Eulalia(1885), portraying the legend that the martyred saint, whose body was thrown naked into the pagan Forum, was covered by a gentle fall of unseasonal snow, received the highest critical praise. His position was assured and, in 1885, he was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy, aged 36. He became a full member in 1895.

In 1888, Waterhouse painted one of his largest and most famous classical canvases, Miramne leaving the Judgment Seat of Herod. The second, beloved wife of Herod the Great, Miriamne was condemned to death by Herod in 24 BC in a welter of dynastic and political struggles partially orchestrated by Herod's sister. Miriamne is shown being led to execution while her nemesis, in half-darkness, holds the miserable King's arm. Waterhouse was perfecting the "snapshot" illustration, catching in a single moment the high drama of a tremendous story. This painting was shown throughout Europe and won many awards internationally. But a sea-change in the artist's interests was near; Miriamne is his one of his last significant paintings based on ancient history.

Miriamne Leaving the Judgment Seat of Herod, 1887

In 1888, Waterhouse exhibited one of his greatest canvases, The Lady of Shalott, at the Royal Academy and for the rest of his life would seek his subjects anew; in the myths of classical Greece and Rome, the tales of Renaissance Italy and England, the legends of King Arthur. Alfred, Lord Tennyson, had with his Idylls of the King brought the romance of the Arthurian cycle fully into the forefront of Victorian consciousness. For the rest of his career, Waterhouse would return to myth and legend for his inspiration. Circe, Odysseus, Naiads and medieval legends, the heroines of Shakespeare and the sad poem-tales of Keats, increasingly his art reflected a young, beautiful girl in a legendary, often poignant, setting, whether it was Penelope waiting for Odysseus or Ophelia awaiting madness. Beauty was transitory, and tragedy was never far away.

The Lady of Shalott, 1888

Waterhouse's work dipped in popularity following his death in 1917, but it never truly left the mainstream of 20th century art as Alma-Tadema's did. Perhaps it is not only his technical mastery, but his narrative ability, which has seen Waterhouse's paintings soar back into prominence in the last years of the 20th century. Every one of Waterhouse's later paintings tell a story, usually one of beauty and pathos which the viewer must infer from each canvas. Although some refer to him as a pre-Raphaelite artist, Waterhouse was his own man. "The whole tenor of [his] work is classical and Italiante, rather than medieval and Gothic as with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and their folowers."

In conclusion, "The other-wordly aspect of Waterhouse's own nature was given a sense of order by the classical heritage we all share and a personality by the personal quality of the Greek legends, a strong Southern softness akin to Botticelli's in which beauty is shared equally by good and evil and the only human differences are those of youth and age...Waterhouse brought the two other essentials of the great artist in the narrative field, an unerring sense of composition and the instinct for the moment in the story at which everything stands still for our contemplation."

Sources:

JW Waterhouse, Anthony Hobson, 1989, Phaidon Press, Ltd.. From the Web, illustrations were used from the art sites linked below.

John William Waterhouse, Painter of Myth
ArtMagick
WebShots Community - John William Waterhouse
CGFA