This talk examines how the Pre-Raphaelite movement extended beyond Britain. Dr. Lynford will tell the story of the American Pre-Raphaelites, a group of politically radical, abolitionist artists, architects, critics, and scientists. During and after the American Civil War, the American Pre-Raphaelites executed paintings, designed buildings, and published criticism that married principles of social equity, civic engagement, and beauty. Such work, they believed, could foster lasting cultural and political reform.

Dr. Lynford will discuss drawings by the American Pre-Raphaelites currently on display in the exhibition Forgotten Pre-Raphaelites at the Delaware Art Museum. By featuring these lesser-known artists, this show seeks to recover them from the margins of art history and position them at the centre of the Pre-Raphaelite narrative.

Dr. Sophie Lynford

Dr. Lynford is the Annette Woolard-Provine Curator of the Bancroft Collection of Pre-Raphaelite Art at the Delaware Art Museum. She is a specialist in nineteenth-century British and American art. Prior to joining the Delaware Art Museum, she was the Rousseau Curatorial Fellow in European Art at the Harvard Art Museums. Her book, Painting Dissent: Art, Ethics, and the American Pre-Raphaelites, was published by Princeton University Press in fall 2022.