Art in Vctorian Age-Inspiration

Victorian Age Inspiration

The Victorian Age was a period were changes occurred due to inventions of technology started to take place followed by a change in society too. Queen Victoria reigned for 64 years in the nineteenth century and Britain went to an  expansion in art, fashion and high prosperity which led to the use of bright and vivid colours in paintings representing all this. In art they returned to classic realism which was popular with Roman and Greek societies. Due to the changes, the public, artists and scientist portrayed art and aesthetics in a different manner due to the technological advance which were made during that era. 

An example of Victorian paintings
portraying the countryside: 'On the Avon near Bath"

 Queen Victoria reigned from 1837 till 1901 and Britain was one of the most powerful. The Victorian art saw different movements and these were all produced during the Victorian era, they consist of  Classicism, Neo-Classicism,  Realism, Impressionism followed by Post-Impressionism, Symbolism and Victorian. Classicism was influenced by many movements along the time and from realistic it changed to vivid colours and emotional strokes and replaced the realistic form and shadow.Post-Impressionism ended the era of Queen Victoria's reign. 

The growth and prosperity during the era in Britain, inspired many artists to focus  on high fashion and modern elegance. The Victorian artwork which was produced was very elegant and popular and made Britain popular for their finery, modernity and elegant etiquette in the world and as a result Victorian art portrayed high-class events in bold colours showing how wealthy and happy people were.They also depicted scenes from the English countryside, this was a point of view for many people

High-class society

During the 64 years Queen Victoria reigned,many advances in photographic and architectural technology affected changes in art styles  that occurred in Victorian art. Changes happened in form and decorum due to technologies that were getting invented.

High-class events

Contemporary Art Inspired from Victorian Era

As time went by, Victorian art always remained popular and inspiring to design or art. Many art movements got inspired and developed from it such Impressionism and Post-Impressionism. The Arts and Crafts movement (1860-1910)  which was set-up by William Morris was inspired from the Victorian era and created many patterns and designs. Contemporary artists such as photographers, fashion designers, graphic designers as well as product designers produced collections with  Victorian art but with a contemporary twist.

Victorian art made a boom in history since the changes took place and people woke up on their feet to work and produce art and coming up with new, innovative concepts. Along the time  photographers did reapplications of paintings in their photography, fashion designers produced haute couture collections inspired from Victorian clothing or paintings.As seen in many of the paintings, women wore bright or pastel colours combined with flowers on their head or the painting scene set in the English countryside. Later in the twentieth century  modern Victorian was invented and this was the Steampunk. Although steampunk is much more based in design we can find some contemporary paintings with this new theme. 

Helen Warner, 2012, inspired from Millais. 

An example of reapplication of a photo. 

'Opehlia', John Everett Millais, 1851-1852

Victorian Art Inspiration 
in my Visual Product

My idea for the visual product is a headpiece that is inspired from steampunk and victorian art. These two movements although they a different from each other still there is a link between them because both of them are a revolution in art and design. Headpieces were very popular with the high society class in Victorian era, they used to be adorned with flowers, lace and comes in different shapes and sizes. They used to wear hats and headpieces for particular occasions yet some used to always wear. 

Lady in a Rose Hat by Sue Halstenberg (n.d )

This painting above is a modern painting although no date was given. What I liked in this painting is the lace on the decolte up till her neck, it inspired me to add lace in the design of the headpiece and have a combination of an edgy and fashionable headpiece combined with classical and soft look that make it very femminine. Lace is one of my favourite materials because it's very classic and makes any clothing looks timless, on the other hand steampunk is very edgy and modern. 

avictorian.com,2009.The Victorian Artists.[online] Available at : < http://www.avictorian.com/victorianart.html > 

[Accessed 17 December 2013]