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Rossetti, Dante Gabriel - Portraits of Alexa Wilding 3
Identifier
010571
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
Quote from the Tate gallery
"....models favoured by Rossetti included his sister, the poet Christina Rossetti, who sat for his earliest works, including The Girlhood of Mary Virgin (1848-49). He painted Christina’s brunette hair as auburn, indicative of what would become Rossetti’s obsession with red hair – leading him to meet and fall in love with Lizzie. Another of his most constant models was the beautiful Alexa Wilding, who inspired some of his most sexually provocative paintings, including Monna Vanna (1866), Sancta Lilias (1874) and Venus Verticordia (1864-68) – notable for being Rossetti’s only famous painting to depict a naked woman. Alexa, unlike the majority of Rossetti’s models, seemed to be able to resist the artist’s advances.
Text by Lucinda Hawksley"
A description of the experience
