a steely determination. Not conventionally beautiful, she took mod-
elling seriously, and used it as a way to gain access into a creative
milieu, starting to produce her own work after becoming the
muse, lover and, finally, wife of Rossetti. When his sister Christina
also took up sketching, he warned her in a letter to ‘take care how-
ever not to rival the Sid, but keep within respectful limits’, offering
a glimpse into just how passionate Siddal was about pursuing her
art. Sadly, the potential for her talent to flourish was cut short;
a laudanum addiction, combined with severe depression worsened
by a stillbirth, led to her untimely death at just 32. It is perhaps
unfortunate that the Gothic details surrounding her demise, such
as the story of Rossetti exhuming her coffin in order to retrieve a
manuscript of poems he had buried with her, have
tended to overshadow her remarkable life.
A rather happier ending awaited Effie Gray, who left
her first husband, the art critic John Ruskin, for Millais,
the two having fallen in love when Millais travelled up
to Scotland to paint Ruskin’s portrait. Trapped in a stul-
tifying, sexless marriage, Gray found her life changed
utterly when she moved in with the Pre-Raphaelite
artist – they ended up having eight children, and she
acted as his unofficial manager,
booking the models, making
sure the studio ran smoothly and
liaising with clients. It is fasci-
nating to observe the contrast
between the portrait that her first
husband commissioned of her
and those that were drawn
by her second. The former, by
Thomas Richmond, shows a
classic Victorian maiden, smiling
sweetly, with sloping shoulders
and a tightly corseted waist. ‘It
is the most lovely piece of oil
painting but much prettier than
me,’ Gray wrote to her mother
at the time, apparently strug-
gling to identify with the image.
‘I look like a graceful doll but
John and his father are delighted
with it.’ It certainly bears little resemblance to the studies that
Millais made of her, in which she appears stronger and more self-
contained, with the face of a real person, rather than a delicate
miniature. Gray quite literally escaped from the Victorian arche-
type of the ‘angel in the house’ and became an equal partner in a
relationship that allowed her to thrive.
Another woman who found her circumstances transformed by
marriage into this set was Jane Morris, the daughter of a stable-hand
and a laundress. Born Jane Burden, she was so striking in her youth
that Rossetti and Edward Burne-Jones asked her to pose for their
series of Arthurian murals. Through them, she met William Morris,
who fell in love with her and swiftly proposed. While not necessarily
returning his affection, she seems to have recognised the advantages
that such a marriage would bring, and had no hesitation in accept-
ing his offer. Following their engagement, she decisively set about
Right: Jane Morris
in Dante Gabriel
Rossetti’s ‘Proserpine’
(1877). Below: Morris
photographed by
John Robert Parsons
in 1865. Bottom:
Fanny Cornforth in
Rossetti’s ‘The Blue
Bower’ (1865)PHOTOGRAPHS: PRIVATE COLLECTION, © NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY, LONDON, THE HENRY BARBER TRUST, THE BARBER INSTITUTE OF FINE ARTS, UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM, GETTY IMAGES, FREDERICK HOLLAGER/PRIVATE COLLECTION/THE STAPLETON COLLECTION/BRIDGEMAN IMAGES, © VICTORIA & ALBERT MUSEUM, LONDON, © TATE, LONDON 2019