The barriers Nelly and her sister students faced were entrenched everywhere, and this is the first detailed account I’ve seen of women’s long struggle to bring them down. Thanks, Sarah.
This is brilliant, Sarah. And shocking too - the way that the Victorian art establishment treated women was absolutely outrageous! Not sure whether I mentioned this before, but my latest novel (Topsy & Co) is narrated by Georgie Burne-Jones and centred on the life of William Morris. So much overlap with the characters and institutions you mention here.
It's so important to keep celebrating and remembering these pioneering women...I find it extraordinary that there are huge parts of the world where women are still second class citizens, if that, and even parts of the world that want to go backwards...
Once again I am amazed at the depth of your knowledge & generosity in sharing this with others. I have, for instance, admired the work of the Pre-Raphaelites for many years & attended as many exhibitions of their work as I can but have never had the pleasure of seeing any work of any female Pre-Raphaelite artists. I feel both proud of the women who struggled £ fought gained so much for us &
Sarah- For some reason this is the part that stood out to me the most: “For the next twenty years until her death from Spanish flu, contracted while nursing war refugees in Tuscany, she built her reputation as a book illustrator, working at a phenomenal pace, travelling and drawing all over Europe.” Maybe because it shows just the breadth of her vast work? Thanks for sharing this.
The barriers Nelly and her sister students faced were entrenched everywhere, and this is the first detailed account I’ve seen of women’s long struggle to bring them down. Thanks, Sarah.
This is brilliant, Sarah. And shocking too - the way that the Victorian art establishment treated women was absolutely outrageous! Not sure whether I mentioned this before, but my latest novel (Topsy & Co) is narrated by Georgie Burne-Jones and centred on the life of William Morris. So much overlap with the characters and institutions you mention here.
What a story. You are sometimes humbled by these stories and this is just one of those, wonderful.
But I also worry that society has become so ignorant & shallow that we have let them down…
It's so important to keep celebrating and remembering these pioneering women...I find it extraordinary that there are huge parts of the world where women are still second class citizens, if that, and even parts of the world that want to go backwards...
Once again I am amazed at the depth of your knowledge & generosity in sharing this with others. I have, for instance, admired the work of the Pre-Raphaelites for many years & attended as many exhibitions of their work as I can but have never had the pleasure of seeing any work of any female Pre-Raphaelite artists. I feel both proud of the women who struggled £ fought gained so much for us &
Sarah- For some reason this is the part that stood out to me the most: “For the next twenty years until her death from Spanish flu, contracted while nursing war refugees in Tuscany, she built her reputation as a book illustrator, working at a phenomenal pace, travelling and drawing all over Europe.” Maybe because it shows just the breadth of her vast work? Thanks for sharing this.
Wonderful writing about a fascinating woman (and I was interested to see your book-length biography in a google image search of the artist, btw).
Always happy to send a copy of my Nelly biography to a new subscriber…