Illustration:
Edward Burne Jones. The Failure of Sir Gawaine; Sir Gawaine & Sir Uwaine at the Ruined Chapel.The five illustrations of this article are part of a sequence of ten tapestries, six major panels and four linking pieces, designed by Edward Burne-Jones and produced by Morris & Co.
Based on the King Arthur legend of the knightly quest for the Holy Grail, it was completed at the very end of the nineteenth century and can be seen as perhaps one of the last grand romantic gestures of the era.
Burne-Jones, though the major contributor to the tapestries, was not the only designer. While he produced the major figurative pieces of the tapestry sequence, William Morris designed the heraldry aspects while John Henry Dearle designed much of the decorative detail. In this way it can be seen as a joint project between Burne-Jones and Morris & Co.
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Edward Burne-Jones. Knights of the Round Table Summoned to the Quest by the Strange Damsel.This was undoubtedly the largest single tapestry contract that Morris & Co ever had to deal with, and was produced for William Knox D'Arcy for the dining room of Stanmore Hall, his Middlesex home.
However, by the time that this tapestry sequence had been commissioned, before even being woven, both the ideal behind the tapestries and the makers themselves, Morris & Co, were being seen as somewhat quaint and the commission itself, as a little old fashioned, the subject being deemed by the end of the nineteenth century, as more appropriate for a child than an adult.
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Edward Burne-Jones. The Attainment; the Vision of the Holy Grail to Sir Galahad, Sir Bors & Sir Percival.Morris himself had died in 1896, before the tapestries were completed, though his company continued to function after his death. But even before his death, the company which had been so completely identified with his strident personality, was struggling to compete with a number of other companies that were producing similar 'art furniture and accessories' pitched at the wealthy middle classes.
Morris's competitors were gaining ground for a number of reasons, one of the main ones being that they usually retailed pieces at a fraction of the cost of Morris & Co. Admittedly, usually because they were retailing mass-produced work that gave the appearance of hand-production. Another reason was that many of Morris's rivals were usually more aware of and linked with, the current fashions of the day. Morris, and therefore his company, thought that he was above or at least immune to the fickleness of the fashionable set but still had their loyalty, he was not and he didn't, and his company suffered as a consequence.
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Edward Burne-Jones. The Ship.However, although this was basically considered as a Burne-Jones project and the artist had a long history connecting him to both Morris and the company, the sequence of tapestries was grudgingly favoured by the contemporary critics. Although many saw the subject matter as old fashioned, sentimental and even childish, none could fault Burne-Jones and his extraordinary draughtsmanship.
This could also be seen as the last major work produced by Burne-Jones, as he died in 1898. It seems a fitting end to a largely successful career. While we have lost the ideas behind the sentimentality of the work, as they had begun to when they were originally designed, the tapestries seem to be as startlingly beautiful to us today as they were over a hundred years ago.
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Edward Burne-Jones. Verdure with Deer & Shields.A sequence of the tapestries can now be seen at
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