The Secret Society of the Pre-Raphaelites

They preferred the Middle Ages to the progress of the Industrial Revolution. The painters of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood were true revolutionaries. In 1848, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and another five students at the Royal Academy began signing their paintings with the initials PRB, shrouding this acronym in mystery. Behind the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood lay the allure of Dante and the cursed stories of Shakespeare, the poetry of Keats and the vastness of the Bible. These were the arms employed against the hated Academy, where painting languished in the cages of convention. And Raphael? The artist from Urbino was considered the first perpetrator of the destruction of art, having spoiled it with affectation. It was necessary to get back to the origins, follow the lead of the primitive Italians. Young, audacious, bohemian, the Pre-Raphaelites scandalised England with their non-conformist life-styles. Then the group vanished along with its secret name, leaving a lasting influence behind. It is quite evident looking at the paintings at the Tate Britain - in no time at all, the rebels of Victorian England left their mark with masterpieces such as Ophelia and The Lady of Shalott, changing art history from illustration to photography.