The mid-1800s witnessed a period of significant change. Following the French Revolution of 1789, a domination of Europe by Napoleon’s imperial ambitions from the year 1848 heralded the overthrow of some of the most important European dynasties. Furthermore, this period remarked a reformist spirit inspired by a zeal for social justice that was introduced by the French Revolution, which significantly became a universal ambition in all European countries. Talking of Britain, it too had several political changes as the young Queen Victoria came to the throne in 1837. At this time, when the social, economic, and political orders were changing, there was a small spark of artistic revolution, which became one of the most significant in the formation of a new philosophy. Despite the short life of this movement, it actually initiated a change that had a profound effect on British painting after the mid-19th century. This movement was none other than pre-Raphaelitism whose leaders were John Everett Millais, Rossetti, and William Holman Hunt. Today, through this article, I will discuss Isabella and the Pot of Basil painting, one of Holman Hunt’s most significant works, which not only will captivate your thoughts for a moment but will also provide you with a brief insight into the movement.
Isabella and the Pot of Basil: An Introduction.
The painting illustrates the story of doomed love that was recounted in Keats’ poem, “Isabella or The Pot of Basil.” It says,
“Fair Isabel, poor simple Isabel!
Lorenzo, a young palmer in Love’s eye!
They could not in the self-same
mansion dwell
Without some stir of heart, some malady;
They could not sit at meals but
feel how well
It soothed each to be the other by.”
However, William’s version of the painting is from the later stage of the poem which says,
“And she forgot the stars, the moon, and sun,
And she forgot the blue above the trees,
And she forgot the dells where waters run,
And she forgot the chilly autumn breeze;
She had no knowledge when the day was done,
And the new morn she saw not: but in peace
Hung over her sweet Basil evermore,
And moisten’d it with tears unto the core.”
The story revolves around Isabella and Lorenzo whose impeccable love story takes twists and turns. Isabella fell in love with Lorenzo, an employee in her brother’s business. She hoped to marry him but she didn’t know that her brothers were enraged by their affair. So, they murdered Lorenzo and buried him in a forest. To Isabella, they conveyed that he was sent away on business. However, the storyline changes when Lorenzo’s ghost appears in her dream to reveal her true fate; she exhumes Lorenzo’s body only to keep his head which she covered with basil. When the brothers discover this, they steal the pot, and Isabella dies broken-hearted.
The composition shows Isabella as a dark-haired Mediterranean woman, whose arms tenderly embrace a pot decorated with skulls. The skull pot is symbolic of the head of her lover as basil grows in it. Wearing a clinging nightdress, which emphasizes her curves, her feet are bare to strengthen her sensuality. Isabella mourns over the pot of basil that has the head of her lover.
The Historical Provenance
In August 1866, the artist embarked on a long journey to the East with his wife. Their departure caused great anguish as his wife Fanny was five months pregnant. However, she was a strong-willed woman who was deeply in love with her husband and had no intention of remaining in England while he went off without her. When the couple reached Marseilles, they were unable to take the boat to Alexandria as planned because of the outbreak of cholera. However, as the secretary of the P&O Line assured them that the next boat would take them to their destination, they waited. When the next boat arrived, they learned about the ban on moving anywhere because the disease outbreak of cholera was not lifted and it had now been imposed at all the Italian ports. Leaving no choice, the couple remained in Florence. William began to look for a studio where he could work. Despite their love of art and architecture of the city, William was unimpressed with its citizens. In one of the letters to Stephens, he wrote,
“These Italians here are not on this slight acquaintance a very satisfactory set, they are the filthiest people I ever knew. Such stinks meet you on the street and wake you up at night that it seems Pestilence must be on the threshold with destruction for the whole city, and yet I live in the most cared for part of the town.”
As October came nearer, Fanny went into labor. She suffered terrible pain and had dangers to her life. Hunt reconciled himself to the loss of their baby on 26 October, who miraculously survived despite the head injuries. However, Fanny was exhausted with all the sufferings, and so on December 20, 1866, she died of a military fever. William called their child Cyril Benone, which means child of sorrow. The same day, Woolner wrote to Stephens that William lost his wife. Though Tommy Woolner went to Florence to help the artist with practical matters like Fanny’s funeral, nothing consoled the artist. He wrote to Stephens,
“I am alone now- more tragically solitary than ever I knew a man in this world could be… I cannot divest myself of the belief that I am more constantly afflicted than many other men and that such frequent trials are much more than any feebleness can bear…”
At this time of grief, William returned to England, and Woolner called on Rossetti, who recorded his visit in his diary,
“He says Hunt is much overcome, and greatly wrapped up now in his infant, who seems ominously delicate. He proposes to send it to Mrs Waugh, and to go on himself in course of time to Jerusalem.”
At this difficult period of time, he wanted something so that he could get himself out of the grief. He did this by busying himself with his wife’s monument, which he designed himself. And then he began to combine two pictures of Fanny in a single picture, forming Isabella and the Pot of Basil painting.
A Closer Look at Isabella and the Pot of Basil Painting.
Isabella has been portrayed as a beautiful lady with long hair flowing over the pot of basil. Just awoke from an unmade bed, her long flowing hair with locks. The artist has presented Isabella in sensual form, who is capable of stealing in Lorenzo’s bedroom.
She doesn’t look towards the viewer as if she is drowned in grief and pain of her lost lover. Her hands are wrapped around the pot as if she holds her lover with an intense devotion. The pot sits on a bright tablecloth that covers the wooden substance. It has depiction of skull heads, which remind the spectator of its grisly contents, but the red roses at the base give an emblem of love rather than death. This symbiosis of love and death is often seen in European paintings.
The artist’s composition is impacted by the Northern Renaissance’ Annunciation, when the Virgin’s bedchamber is furnished with a prayer desk and missal. Isabella also has a majolica pot, which is partially covered by an altar cloth embroidered with the name ‘Lorenzo.’ Further, the embroidered cloth has a Latin inscription ‘[love] is strong as death’.
The subject wears a white color sheer dress on her voluptuous figure to mourn her lover. She drapes an indigo scarf around her waist that might be an important element showcasing the luxury of the Victorian era, as indigo was imported from India. Two roses near her feet symbolize the incomplete love she had.
The background shows the interiors of the Victorian period which vastly include an abundance of patterns, heavy draperies, and glass hanging lamps. The first thing you see in the background is the unmade bed where Isabella slept. Another important element here is the frieze of figures playing musical instruments above the open door that is closely based on Luca della Robbia’s sculpted Reliefs From the Singing Gallery or Cantoria of 1431-38, which Hunt would have studied in the courtyard of the Muzeo Nationale, Florence.
The composition is an outward expression of the artist’s grief due to his wife’s death. Exactly, two to three years later, he painted another celebrated picture, The Shadow of Death that was loaded with typological symbolism.
Other Paintings Inspired
The first Isabella was composed by John Everett Millais in 1848 and was exhibited a year later. He shows the lovers oblivious to the others around them. Lorenzo offers a blood orange on a plate and Isabella looks downwards as one of her brothers kicks a dog in fury over their obvious regard to each other. Despite the kick by her brother on the dog, she pets it warmingly, which might be a symbol to depict her compassionate love for her lover. The pale face of Isabella somehow connects with the Renaissance Madonna and it is possible that Millais added this to give a spiritual connection with love.
Another painting of Isabella is by Waterhouse who can make any beautiful subject melancholic with his intrinsic talents. Waterhouse and William had a little in common in portraying Isabella- they both showed the girl caressing her basil pot with an emotional appeal. Waterhouse reinterpreted this scene in a Renaissance garden, further emphasizing Isabella’s tears through the effect of her long hair, gown, and sleeves, which guide our eye along an L-shaped arc from the basil leaves to her hem. He emphasizes her pain through her position as she kneels down. The flowers and foliage in Keats’ poem and this canvas is similar- lushly verdant but the aura of decay is portrayed by an ominous skull. He adds medievalised sleeves and virtuosic white-on-white brushwork of the loose-fitting over-dress to portray the Renaissance style.
Another important composition inspired by the story is of John White Alexander who shows Isabella in a rather black and white dress in an intimate form. He used a dark mood to portray the dark love of Isabella after the death of Lorenzo.
Final Words
Isabella and the Pot of Basil painting shows the woman’s state of mind by means of her physical environment. To me, the vase is like succumbing pain of isolation that a woman refuses to go through until she suffers a nervous breakdown and this psychological trauma precipitates her realization that she must leave the confines of this enclosed artifice to move on and live a life. The other elements of the canvas, including the messy bed, represent the impacts of trauma that occur in the surroundings, invisible to the woman until she finally breaks the balloon of illusion. The artist has well described the emotion of loneliness, grief, and pain through this composition with themes of death, love, and departure.
Resources.
- William Holman Hunt: The True Pre-Raphaelite by Anne Clark Amor.
- Christie’s.
- William Holman Hunt and Typological Symbolism by George P Landow.
- The Victorians: British Painting, 1837-1901 by Malcolm Warner, Charles Brock, and Anne Helmreich.
- The Pre-Raphaeliter by Robert de La Sizeranne.
- Holman Hunt and the Light of the Wolrd by Jeremy Maas.
- The Pre-Raphaelites (Treasures of Art) by Trewin Copplestone.
- The Pre-Raphaelite Landscape by Allen Staley.
- Featured Image: Isabella and the Pot of Basil by William Holman Hunt; William Holman Hunt, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
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