This major retrospective of Pre-Raphaelite artist, John William Waterhouse (1849-1917) will feature over 40 paintings together with sketchbooks and drawings from public and private collections worldwide.

John William Waterhouse, A Mermaid, 1900. Oil on canvas, 96.5 x 66.6 cm. Royal Academy of Arts, London. Photo © Royal Academy of Arts, London

The exhibition will consider how Waterhouse's paintings reflect his engagement with contemporary issues ranging from medievalism and the classical heritage to spiritualism and the New Woman. Born the year the Pre-Raphaelites declared their rebellion against the Royal Academy, Waterhouse also inherited their taste for Tennyson, Keats, and Shakespeare, and drew from classical myth as interpreted by Homer and Ovid.

During the 1890s, Waterhouse gravitated toward images of metamorphosis: lily-like nymphs seducing Hylas into their pool; Circe pouring the poison that will transform Scylla; Echo and Narcissus pining away; Lamia enchanting Lycius with her snake-scale shawl wrapped around her. Waterhouse’s career closed with a decisive return to emotive "Pre-Raphaelite" narratives such as The Lady of Shalott, Tristram and Isolde, and The Decameron.