Lot 220
SIR EDWARD BURNE-JONES (1833-1898) FOR MORRIS & CO.
'ANGEL HOLDING THE STAR OF BETHLEHEM', A STAINED GLASS PANEL, 1915
Auction: Day One inc Contents from a London Apartment | Lots 197 to 333 | Wednesday 15th October
Description
stained, leaded and painted glass, within chenille material border, framed in later carved oak frame and including a light box
“These exceptional windows (lots 219 & 220) by Morris & Co show the firm using the same designs from Burne-Jones in a late commission long after William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones had died. Their aesthetic beauty and impeccable quality are testament to the dedication of John Henry Dearle, Morris’s brilliant apprentice and later art director for the firm who continued to honour the legacy of the firm by adapting earlier designs to new commissions.” - John Mackie, Head of Design
Dimensions
56cm x 62cm (frame size excluding light box 79.4 high, 85.3cm wide, 13.1cm deep)
Provenance
Haslam & Whiteway, London
Private collection, London
Footnote
Literature: Cormack P. Morris & Company's Stained Glass for The Chapel of Cheadle Royal Hospital, Haslam & Whiteway Ltd. catalogue 2008, pp. 40-41.
The original version of this design by Burne-Jones was drawn for the famous Morris & Co. tapestry The Adoration of the Magi, first woven in 1886-90 for the chapel of Exeter College, Oxford (where both Morris and Burne-Jones had been students in the 1850s). Burne-Jones also used the same subject, with minor changes, for an enormous watercolour, The Star of Bethlehem, commissioned by Birmingham City Art Gallery in 1887. The Morris firm adapted Burne-Jones's design - more closely following the tapestry version than the watercolour - for at least two other stained glass windows, at Westerham church (1909) and St Michael's church, Macclesfield (1918). The current lot formed part of the upper section of the Nativity scene from the Chapel's west window.