SIR EDWARD COLEY BURNE-JONES, BT., A.R.A., R.W.S. | STUDY FOR THE HEAD OF PERSEUS IN THE ROCK OF DOOM

H.S. Theobald Esq. by 1899;

Probably purchased in 1904 by prominent art collectors in Wales and thence by family descent

The 'Perseus Series' is one of the artist's greatest artistic triumphs, albeit an unfinished one, but it is also one of the most ambitious and remarkable decorative projects of the Nineteenth Century. Commissioned in the spring of 1875 by the rising Conservative politician Arthur Balfour for the dining room of his London house at 4 Carlton Gardens, it was worked upon for more than a decade. Based upon Morris' 'The Doom of King Acrisius' from Earthly Paradise, it tells the tale of the hero Perseus, son of the King of Argos. The annotation on the present drawing refers to Perseus and Andromeda of 1876 (Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide) a composition later re-imagined as two canvases The Rock of Doom and The Doom Fulfilled (Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart and full-scale cartoons at Southampton City Art Gallery).