Studio: international art (51.1911)

Painted Glass designed by Sir E. Burne-Jones

designer for the best and most important class of
work, viz., the delineation of the human figure,
and as such his productions (for which Morris
himself entertained a boundless admiration to the
end) came to be treated with more care and
respect than the rest. Therefore it seldom
happened that originals by Burne-Jones were
allowed to drift away into alien channels. By far
the largest proportion of the drawings he made
for the firm still remain in their possession.

In the case of the designs he made for Messrs.
Powell, Burne-Jones prepared the cartoon com-
plete, coloured and ready for working from, lead-
lines included; and some also of the earlier
windows designed for Morris & Co. were prepared
in the same way. Thus in the originals of the
charming series illustrative of the Song of Songs,

designed about 1862, in Darley Dale Church,
Derbyshire, the lead-lines duly appear. Again,
two beautiful groups of angels, designed by Burne-
Jones about the middle of the “sixties” of the
nineteenth century, and executed for the Church
of the Annunciation at Brighton, also exhibit the
lead-lines. But this practice was not long con
tinued and was finally abandoned after 1870, if
indeed any instance of its survival at so late a date
ever occurred.

The circumstance was probably due to the
organised practice of co-operation adopted by the
firm. Thus there grew up the custom of Burne-
Jones designing nothing but the figures. At first
William Morris used to design the floral back-
grounds and ornaments in the robes, but sub-
sequently the responsibility of the accessories

devolved upon Mr. H.
Dearie, who for years
past has had the whole
arranging of every
work of stained-glass
executed by the firm.
The two figures of
Adam and Eve at
Frankby, Cheshire (p.
101) were drawn by
Burne-Jones simply
nude, and the trees and
lead-lines provided by
other hands. The date
is uncertain, but there
is reason to believe
that the work belongs
to about 1870-75. To
the same decade be-
longs a magnificent
series of windows in
the transept at Jesus
College, Cambridge.
They include the
Sibyls, who hold, in
mediaeval art and
legend, a place only
second to that of the
Old Testament pro-
phets themselves (pp.
95. 97)•

The Vyner memorial
window (p 93) already
referred to, at Oxford,
was designed in 1872.
The richest variations
in the colouring are

WINDOWS IN ULLETT ROAD CHAPEL, LIVERPOOL

DESIGNED BY SIR E. BURNE-JONES

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