The Days of Creation: The First Day

1871 · Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge

religious

In 1871, Burne-Jones began work on the series of The Days of Creation. He worked on the angels off and on through 1876. The series consists of six panels, one for each day, with an angel at rest seated at the bottom of the sixth panel for the seventh day.

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About the Artist

Edward Burne-jones

1833 – 1898

Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones was an English painter and decorative artist. He was the leading figure in the second phase of the Pre-Raphaelite movement, and he was influenced by the art of Dante Gabriel Rossetti. His paintings of subjects from medieval legend and Classical mythology and his designs for stained glass, tapestry and many other media played an important part in the Aesthetic Movement and the history of international Symbolism. Although his works lacked the social ideals of the Pre-Raphaelites, his mystic, romantic images often represent a world free of industrialism. His paintings are characterized by the influence of Mantegna and Botticelli, but done in a subdued tonal palette.

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