The Walker Art Gallery will showcase more than 120 Pre-Raphaelite paintings as part of a major new exhibition.
‘Pre-Raphaelites: Beauty and Rebellion’ will run from February 12th until June 5th 2016 and is set to display some of the most popular works from the period.
The term stems from the original Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, who were a group of painters and poets who reformed against what they deemed ‘mechanical art’ during the 19th Century.
The exhibition will feature paintings on loan from various institutions as well as private collections, many of which have never before been on public display.
One of the major paintings will be The Salutation of Beatrice, a little known work by Dante Gabrielle Rossetti which will be on display for the first time since it was created in 1881/2.
Sandra Penketh, Director of Art Galleries at National Museums Liverpool spoke of her excitement that the exhibition has come to fruition, following years of planning, to tell the Pre-Raphaelite story through a Liverpool lens.
She told JMU Journalism: “As part of the exhibition, we look forward to welcoming Pre-Raphaelite masterpieces from across the UK to the Walker, which houses a world-renowned collection of its own.
“The Pre-Raphaelite movement is an incredibly appealing one and we’re sure that our visitors will love the exhibition and be fascinated by the new stories it reveals.”
The exhibition comes after it was revealed that the Walker Art Gallery has been chosen to become one of three UK galleries to become national partners for the Arts Council Collection.
Along with galleries in Birmingham and Eastbourne, the Walker is set to host 24 exhibitions over the next three years to mark the 70th anniversary of the Arts Council and the collection which is the finest collection of modern and contemporary British art in the world.
The new partnership will see the Walker gain around £600,000 in funding in order to help the gallery improve the quality of its exhibitions and reach new audiences, specifically children and young people.