Through his investigation of the forces that move both humanity and the cosmos itself, English artist George Frederic Watts (1817–1904) rendered visions of profound beauty, sensitivity, and foresight. His work has garnered little attention in recent decades outside of his native England, and as we shall see, deserves a prime honor in the larger context of 19th century visionary art.
Watts began his artistic career painting portraits which eventually would include many famous men and women of 19th century England. His social prowess and success attracted opportunities to paint such cultural titans as William Morris and Dante Gabriel Rosetti in a series he called the “Hall of Fame”. This series of worthy men was complimented by a set of portraits of young women, including his (brief) first wife Ellen. He was one of the rarer artists who achieved great success and fame in his lifetime, known variously as “England’s Michelangelo” and “the most famous artist in the world.”
The more we investigate the life and works of Watts, the more likable he becomes as both an artist and a person. His sense of caring and social concern may be connected to his own lifelong suffering due to weak health. In a film on the artist, curator Veronica Franklin Gould says how he “would on occasion be struck down to his bed for days at a time, and he often thought he saw what he called the ‘Angel of Death’.” This vulnerability perhaps amplified his aesthetic sensitivity and compassion for others. For instance, he paid for and organized a commemorative chapel in central London known as Postman’s Park in which is displayed a series of plaques narrating the heroic sacrifices of ordinary men and women in saving the lives of others. One plaque reads: “Mary Rogers, Stewardess of the Stella; March 30, 1899, self sacrificed by giving up her life belt and voluntarily going down with the sinking ship.” New plaques continue to be added to the chapel to this day. One cannot help but feel a great-hearted person lay behind this project.
His intensive social concern emerged through many paintings as well. As one art historian explained, he became increasingly political as he got older. In his work he sought to raise awareness on such contemporary issues as evolution (as in his painting of that name), inequality (as in Found Drowned), and the slaughtering of exotic birds for feathers used to ornament fashionable hats (as in A Dedication). In The Minotaur (1885), we see the hideous mythical beast eagerly anticipating the next shipment of youths for him to devour in the labyrinth. This mythological and allegorical work is in fact a political reflection of the moment where reports of child prostitution were exploding in London news sources, during which the change in legal age of sexual consent was from 13 to 16. Knowing this, we now feel the force of Watts’ sober and unflinching gaze in facing such horror in society. We too are challenged to do the same by reflecting on the monstrous therianthrope and the crushed hummingbird under its calloused hand reverberating with anguish.
By the 1870s, Watts began to explore the cosmic forces of creation and the evolution of humanity through allegory, myth, and symbolism. He planned, though never completed, a series of frescoes called The House of life depicting these grand themes. Like many intellectuals of his day, he wrestled with the implications of Darwin’s Origin of Species. He was also interested in astronomy and was friends with the renowned astronomer John Herschel. Other cultural forces inspiring his work included the Pre-Raphaelite movement as well as the removal of the so-called Elgin Marbles from Athens to London, the renowned Parthenon sculptures that Watts came to revere and utilize for many of his figures.
Watts’ creativity unlocked a series of profoundly visionary paintings of great cosmic and emotional scope. Among the most energetic and luminous is The Dweller in the Innermost (1885–86), whose poignant title took Watts seven years to decide. Its previous titles were The Soul’s Prism and The Dweller in the Infinite, all seeming ways to articulate the ineffable and profound vision behind it. Here we behold an extraordinary window onto an angelic being pensively seated with a trumpet and arrows upon her lap. Though the figure is articulately rendered, she is in low contrast compared to the light that really activates our vision. Surrounding her shimmers a radiant mandorla. Its rippling energy vibrates as the auric field of the angelic figure, as well as seems to sanctify our vision and mind upon beholding such a holy being. The sense of revelation and privileged vision into a profound mystery is palpable.
Watts’ visionary exploration continued in The All-Pervading (1887–90). Its grandeur and poetic force strike us immediately as we behold another angelic figure gently holding a globe on her lap. Housed at the Tate, London, their website describes how Watts found inspiration for the painting “while observing the play of light on the glass drops of an elaborate chandelier…” (Tate website) Though Watts’ intended for the globe to symbolize the entire cosmos, it reverberates as both the Earth and new life in the womb, two themes merged together here for the first time in Western art which would continue through today as a central motif of visionary art — Earth as mother and womb for the birth of a new world. The angel’s robes ripple with great sensitivity and feeling, undoubtedly transmuting Watts’ reverence for the draperies of the Elgin marbles. Who is this being? Watts described her as “ ‘the all-pervading Spirit of the Universe seated, holding in her lap the ‘Globe of Systems’” (Tate website). Watts’ avoidance of the word “God” or “Holy Ghost” suggests something significant in his state of mind; his search for truth remained open not only to religion but mythology, science, and direct experience — a dynamic openness embraced by visionary artists today. This “Spirit” emanates to us as a mystical vision of divine creative mystery — not quite fully articulated in any one source. Its presence is luminous and compassionate, and yet enshadowed. Though more darkness than light fills the composition, the light areas flicker and vibrate. These luminous energies express Watts’ vision of a force of the cosmos — a creative force perhaps best exemplified by the lightest touch of the Spirit’s fingers upon the globe — at the spiritual intersection between gentleness, sadness, wisdom and compassion.
Near the end of his life, Watts painted Sower of the Systems (1902) in which we behold a cosmic being spreading seeds of light into the darkness. Ethereal and energetic, this being casts the stars like a mage throwing sparks from his hands. From this rear view, we read the figure’s intent not through their face but solely through their gesture, which speaks of complete immersion in the process of primordial creation. Heroic, magical, and potent, this painting anticipates the transition into abstraction that was imminent at the dawn of the 20th century. The robes virtually dissolve into a kinesthetic thrust of abstract expressionism. In its striving for cosmic proportions, the figure also, in a way, anticipates elements of fantasy art, and the heroic characters and deeds that would populate magical realms in books, games, comics, and films today. The minotaur is slain.
In a 2017 article in the U.K.’s Spectator magazine, we read:
“On his deathbed in 1904, George Frederic Watts saw [an] extraordinary spectacle. He witnessed the universe coming into being: the ‘breath of the Creator acting on nebulous matter’ causing ‘agitating waves & revolving lines’ to fly out in all directions. With hindsight, it is tempting to conclude that Watts had a vision not, as he thought, of reality in ‘a glorious state’, but of abstract painting.”
Watts’ artistic legacy, though preserved in London’s Tate Gallery (albeit not currently on display) and in his own museum in Compton, England, has been mostly unknown beyond the U.K. in recent decades. In researching this section, I could not find a single monograph on the artist available online or in local libraries. As we have seen, several of his paintings revealed visionary motifs with great force and perhaps anticipated new artistic freedoms to be claimed later in the 20th century. When viewed in the context of visionary art, we can see Watts’ work alongside Moreau and Burne-Jones in the late 19th century as exemplary of many of the themes central to contemporary visionary art. When an artist today, such as Elizabeth Rosemary Banker, speaks of being inspired by “imaginative representations of spirit, energy, and consciousness…making these beings appear ethereal, as though they are made of nebulous matter emerging from the cosmos…” (Women of Visionary Art, p. 197) we see the shimmering work of Watts resounding with precisely these themes over one hundred years ago.
Note:
This article is intended to contribute to a book I am writing entitled Visionary Art. To continue the journey, I invite you to check out my other articles on Medium exploring William Blake, El Greco, and other visionary artists and ideas. Any questions or comments are greatly appreciated. Thanks for reading!
Works Cited:
Film: George Frederic Watts. Illuminations; 2004. Accessed on www.kanopy.com
Maximum Wattage article in Spectator by Martin Gayford; published July 29, 2017. Accessed March 9, 2024. https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/maximum-wattage/
‘The All Pervading’, George Frederic Watts, 1887–90 / Tate. Text on Tate website written by Francis Fowle; published November, 2000. Accessed March 9, 2024. ‘The All-Pervading‘, George Frederic Watts, 1887–90 | Tate
Object in Focus: The Sower of the Systems, 1902 | Watts Gallery and Artists’ Village