The Knight's Guerdon
Robert Braithwaite Martineau (1844–1930)
1864<>Oil on panel
16 ½ x 12 ½ inches (42 x 32 cm).
Collection of the Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archeology, accession no. WA1950.198.
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This work was inspired by the poem ("Sir Galahad" by Alfred Tennyson. When the picture was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1864 a critic for The Art Journal commented: "Near at hand is hung (The Knight’s Guerdon (89), a single, highly-matured, and stately female head by R. B. Martineau, to which in the catalogue he has a right to append the following lines of the poet-Laureate:
‘How sweet the looks that ladies bend
On whom their favours fall.’
(The Art Journal. New series vol. 3, 1864, 161). With its chivalric theme this painting shows Martineau responding to the influence of the second wave of Pre-Raphaelitism. It is also reminiscent the 16th century Venetian-inspired half-length portraits of female models painted by Dante Gabriel Rossetti and his circle in the 1860s. — Dennis T. Lanigan
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Last modified 22 January 2022