Burne-Jones associated this painting with a refrain from a Breton folk ballad: "Alas, I know a love song, / Sad or happy, each in turn." Drawing inspiration from the gothicizing Pre-Raphaelite movement, the artist conjured a twilight scene with a richly romantic, medieval air, enhanced by allusions to Italian Renaissance art, from the warm, dewy colors to the gracious figures and original frame, which recalls sixteenth-and-seventeenth-century Venetian designs. When the picture was first exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery, London, in 1878, the novelist Henry James admiringly compared it to "some mellow Giorgione or some richly-glowing Titian." The lines "Helas, je sais un chant d'amour, / Triste ou gai, tour à tour" appearing in the catalogue of the 1878 Grosvenor Gallery exhibition are first referred to as the refrain of a Breton song in the 1886 Graham sale catalogue. The same lines were used by George du Maurier as the dedication of his book Trilby (1894). Both the Graham sale catalogue of 1886 and the Ruston sale catalogue of 1898 list this picture as having been exhibited at Birmingham in 1885, but this is apparently an error. One of Burne-Jones's studio assistants, T. M. Rooke, made a small copy of the composition in brown wash, which was offered for sale in 1975 by Julian Hartnoll, London.
The Victorian painter Edward Burne-Jones was a friend of William Morris from their time at Oxford, and later of Dante Gabriel Rossetti and John Ruskin. He designed stained glass and tapestries for Morris' firm and was also a gifted book illustrator. Between 1864 and 1870 Burne-Jones worked principally in watercolor, afterwards concentrating on oil painting. He was created a baronet in 1894, and was also a recipient of the Légion d'Honneur, as his work was extremely popular in France, and in Italy as well, from a relatively early date. In a letter of May 30, 1868, to Burne-Jones, William Graham accepted the painter’s offer of first refusal of a version in oil of his watercolor Le Chant d’Amour (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), or The Love Song, which is signed and dated 1865. Graham had bought the watercolor after it was exhibited in 1866 at the Old Watercolour Society, the first work of Burne-Jones that he acquired. As it was hanging in Graham’s London drawing room, he offered to lend it back to the artist from August until November of 1868, when he would be in Scotland. The theme was a refrain in Burne-Jones’s work over more than fifteen years. When, in June 1860, he married Georgiana Macdonald, the couple received as a wedding gift a small upright piano on the inside lid of which he painted an undated vignette showing an angel working the bellows of a portable organ played by a young woman (Victoria and Albert Museum, London). About 1863–65 Burne-Jones made a preparatory study in pencil and red chalk for the musician, and, perhaps also at that time, a sepia wash and gouache study from a model of a boy in the pose, but not the costume, of the knight in armor (Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery). He also made a drawing in pencil or chalk that was described in the catalogue of his 1898 estate as a "study for Love in the ‘Chant D’Amour,’ 1865." After he completed the watercolor that went to Graham, the artist made yet another, which is signed and dated 1866 and shows only the musician and the knight. In 1868 Burne-Jones signaled his intention to begin the present large canvas, which he continued to work on in 1871 and 1873, completed after a month’s work in 1877, and showed for the first time at the Grosvenor Gallery exhibition of 1878. Its critical reception was mixed. For Henry James, Le Chant d’Amour resembled "some mellow Giorgione or some richly-glowing Titian" and was "a brilliant success in the way of color." By contrast, critic W. H. Mallock reacted against the picture’s latent sexuality, finding in the figure of the woman the "languor of exhausted animalism." At the time of the Grosvenor Gallery show, or shortly thereafter, it seems likely that Burne-Jones prepared the beautiful graphite replica (location unknown) that bears his monogram and is inscribed "to JCC," possibly referring to Joseph Comyns Carr, a friend, critic, and codirector of the Grosvenor Gallery. Le Chant d’Amour also made an appearance in miniature. Burne-Jones had fallen in love toward the end of the 1860s with Maria Zambaco, a member of the Greek community in London whose portrait (Clemens-Sels-Museum, Neuss, Germany) he signed and dated August 7, 1870. On the shelf in front of her is an illuminated book open to a page with a tiny replica of the version in watercolor. For Burne-Jones and for his time, Le Chant d’Amour is a key picture, in which Romantic medievalism is suffused with a dewy, pastoral warmth emanating from Renaissance Venice. The traditions of manuscript illumination merge with the influences of Botticelli and Titian. The frame is original, and is consistent with others selected by the artist for paintings of the 1870s (Mitchell and Roberts 2000 and Rosenfeld 2012).
The large, final version of Le Chant d'Amour, a composition which had been in Burne-Jones s mind since the early 1860s, is one of his most hauntingly beautiful works. The musi- cal theme, the emotional tension between the figures, the romantic landscape, and the evening light combine to create a mood of nostalgia and yearning which he often aims for but seldom captures in so intense a form. According to his auto- graph work record (FitzwilHam Museum, Cambridge), the picture was begun in 1868, worked on in 1872-73, and finally completed in 1877 after a month of uninterrupted work. It was exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery the following year togeth- er with Laus Veneris (cat. no. 63), a picture very comparable in size, shape, and Venetian character. Indeed, they were regard- ed as pendants by William Graham, who commissioned them, and who originally hoped to link them with a painting enti- tled Blind Love, which Burne-Jones never completed. 1 Both works were enlarged oil versions of earlier watercolors which also belonged to Graham, who was particularly attached to these Venetian compositions, rich in atmosphere and glowing with color. If Graham liked a design well enough, he would often commission another version. In 1868, the year the pres- ent picture was started, he ordered a large oil version of anoth- er of Burne-Jones's early Giorgionesque idylls, Green Summer (fig. 63)/ and he would later commission large versions of the Briar Rose paintings executed for him in 1871-72 (cat. nos. 55-58). Graham was never to receive these canvases; they turned out to be too large even for his mansion in Grosvenor Place, crowded as this was with the Old Master and modern paint- ings which he bought with such passionate commitment. Thus the large Chant d Amour and Laus Veneris, together with the less Venetian Days of Creation (fig. 79), remained his largest Burne-Joneses, and in due course became the star lots among the thirty- three works by the artist which appeared for sale at Christies following Grahams death in 1885. In fact, Le Chant d Amour realized the highest price of the entire five-day sale, an impressive 3,150 guineas, although this was matched by The Vale of Rest (1858; Tate Gallery, London) by Millais, which had achieved the same figure on the previous day. It was the high prices realized by Burne-Jones s pictures at the Graham sale in 1886 and the Leyland sale six years later that finally established his reputation. Until then, a suspicion remained that his work was a minority taste or cult, and as such might be commercially limited. The Graham and Leyland sales proved that this was not the case. This present exhibition seems to be the first that has included both the early watercolor version of Le Chant d Amour, painted in 1865 (cat. no. 30), and the larger oil started three years later, and they make a fascinating comparison. The general concept remains remarkably similar. Figures, background, foreground flowers, light effect, and color scheme — all are essentially the same; and if the tone seems more somber in the oil, this is largely due to the different technique. The drawing of the figures, however, has improved considerably, showing how hard Burne-Jones had worked to make up for his lack of train- ing and how aware he was that draftsmanship was his weakest point, both from hostile reviews of his early work in the press and the friendly advice of his mentor G. F. Watts. Awkward passages in the early version are also tidied up. The musician's left hand is rethought so that it no longer collides confusingly with the music book. The almost ludicrously prominent soles of the knight s feet are made less conspicuous, and his brown sleeves, which conflict with his red scarf in the watercolor, are replaced by black armour. As for the figure of Cupid, by far the most unsatisfactory passage in the early picture, it undergoes a complete metamorphosis. He sheds his eye bandage, exchanges his heavy drapery for a lighter and more revealing costume, adopts a graceful contrapposto, and folds his wings with becoming elegance. All this reflects the impact that Florentine painting had had on Burne-Jones between the dates when the two versions were completed (1865 and 1877), a period which had included his last two visits to Italy (1871 and 1873). The changes must have taken place when the picture was worked on in 1872-73. It is notice- able that the figure of Love retains its original form in the miniature version of the composition included in the portrait of Maria Zambaco of 1870 (cat. no. 49), and there exists a nude study for the figure in its new form which clearly dates from the early 1870s. 3 So aware of linear rhythm and pattern had Burne-Jones become by this stage that even parts of the design which remain superficially the same are subtly modified. It is instructive to compare the two versions of the musician's dress, noting how he retains certain lines but changes others; to observe how he improves the design of the foreground flowers, grouping them to form more satisfactory patterns in relation to the horizontals behind them; or again, to see how he breaks up the slightly awkward space between the knight's right arm and the musician's dress by introducing a spray of foliage. He was to remain hypersensitive to this kind of problem. In 1896 his assistant T. M. Rooke recorded his "worrying" [about] the shape between the Pilgrim's sleeve and his knee" in Love Leading the Pilgrim (cat. no. 74). It did not, he said, look "a good shape. Perhaps if some thorns were put there they might rem- edy it, if they were rightly designed. ... It will be best not to paint them in today, but to let them soak into one's mind for a few days, and then well see." 4 The large versions of Le Chant d Amour and Laus Veneris have an important place in Burne-Jones's exhibition history. The 1878 exhibition at the Grosvenor was the gallery's second, and both the directors and Burne-Jones himself must have been anxious to maintain the overwhelming impression that his work had made in 1877. Nine works in all were shown, prominently hung in a place of honor in the East Gallery where they would attract maximum attention, and Graham's two large canvases were the focal point of the group. The rest, lent by Frederick Leyland, Alexander Ionides, and others, were smaller works or works executed some years earlier, which did not show the artist at the full extent of his power. Press comment was far less hysterical than it had been the previous year. It is true that F. G. Stephens was a little dismis- sive of Le Chant d Amour, describing it in the Athenaeum as having "'The City of Dreadful Night' for a background, and sundry other peculiarities inviting imaginative explanation," but this was because he was so excited by Laus Veneris that for him everything else paled by comparison. 5 The Times, which had muttered darkly in 1877 about "freaks of eccentricity" and "the strange and unwholesome fruits of hopeless wanderings in the mazes of mysticism and medievalism," 6 was now will- ing to accept the artist on his own terms. "It would be difficult to imagine more thorough absorption of the spirit of an earli- er art than these pictures indicate in their painter. The 'Jardin [sic] d'Amour' affects us like an echo of Carpaccio. If art is to be an echo, this may well be pronounced art of a high and beautiful kind." 7 As for the Illustrated London News, after some almost ritualistic grumbling about Burne-Jones being "occa- sionally so transcendental as to be temporarily incomprehen- sible" and the usual chip-on-the-shoulder swipes at "the initiated," it suddenly came out with the surprising admission that he was, in spite of everything, "a very great artist." 8 As in 1877, however, it was left to Henry James, reviewing the exhibition for the American magazine the Nation, to make the most intelligent comment. True to his stated principle of approaching the artist "good-humouredly and liberally [since] he offers an entertainment which is for us to take or to leave," he poked gentle fun at Le Chant d Amour for representing "a group of three figures, seated, in rather an unexpected manner, upon the top of a garden wall." Nor was he entirely happy with the results of Burne-Jones's scrupulous care for linear harmo- ny. For him, the figures were so "extremely studied and finished in outline" that "they often strike one as vague in modelling — wanting in relief and in the power to detach themselves." At the same time, James saw much to admire. He was enchanted by "the beautiful, rapt dejection of the mysterious young warrior," feeling that it would be hard to "know where to look for a more delicate rendering of a lovesick swain." He also considered the color "a great achievement," creating the effect of "some mellow Giorgione or some richly-glowing Titian." Where he was most perceptive and original, however, was in recognizing Burne-Jones's wholehearted concern with the creation of pictorial fictions. "It will be a matter of course," he wrote, "to say that the subjects are unreal, the type of figure monotonous and unpleasant, the treatment artificial, the intention obscure." All this, he believed, was essentially irrelevant since the works in question "have the great and rare merit that they are pictures. They are conceptions, representations; they have a great ensemble!' This, for him, made Burne-Jones's contribu- tions, whatever their faults, "far away the most interesting and remarkable things in the exhibition," and placed the artist head and shoulders above his peers. "No English painter of our day," he concluded, "has a tithe of his 'distinction.'" 9 After its appearance at the Graham sale, Le Chant d Amour was in two major collections before it left England to find a home in New York. First it belonged to the Lincolnshire col- lector Joseph Ruston, who, like Graham himself, bought extensively in both Old Master and modern fields. In addition to Le Chant d Amour, he owned three paintings by Burne- Jones that had previously been in the Leyland collection, The Mirror of Venus (fig. 86) and Day and Night (1870; both Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, Mass.). Ruston also owned impor- tant Rossettis, notably Veronica Veronese (1872; Delaware Art Museum), as well as examples by Watts, Leighton, and other contemporaries. Ruston's collection was sold at Christie's in May 1898, a month before Burne-Jones's death, and Le Chant dAmourwzs acquired by Thomas Henry Ismay (1837-1899), in whose family it remained until the 1940s. Ismay was one of a group of Liverpool shipowners and merchants who collected the work of Burne-Jones and his followers, almost certainly inspired by the great example of F. R. Leyland. [jc] 1. Information kindly supplied by Oliver Garnett. 2. The large version was sold at Sotheby's on June 19, 1990, lot 32. 3. British Museum, London (1954-5-8-16; see British Museum Collection, 1994, no. 62, illus. p. 91). As often happened, Burne-Jones later misdated the drawing from memory, in this instance assigning it to 1865, the date of the early watercolor. A careful composition drawing (formerly collec- tion of Sir John and Lady Witt; sold Sotheby's, February 19, 1987, lot 173) is of little help in this context since it is clearly a ricordo of the oil version in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. 4. Memorials, vol. 2, p. 296. 5. Athenaeum, no. 2638, May 18, 1878, p. 642. 6. Times (London), May 1, 1877, p. 10. 7. Ibid., May 2, 1878, p. 7. 8. Illustrated London News, May 4, 1878, p. 411. 9. James 1956, pp. 162-64.
Continuing the theme of the language of flowers contained in the earlier version, Burne Jones has included tulips- declaration of love and wallflowers- fidelity in misfortune both of which refer to his current affair with Maria. But in a prominent position he has placed a new flower - the blue Star of Bethlehem which has two meanings, purity ( Le Langage des Fleurs by Latour 1819) or "the light of our path". (The Language of Flowers Pub Milner and Co c 1865)
Burne-Jones used this frame pattern appropriately for his more ‘Venetian’ compositions, such as Le chant d’Amour.[32] The beguiling of Merlin excepted, these are sensuously colourful paintings, admirably complemented by their shimmering, light-filled frames. Although the carving is slightly coarse and schematic compared with that of the 16th century, it must still have presented a challenge to his 19th century framemakers.
Letter to Fairfax Murray July 17 68 My dear little Murray. Chant d'Amour has / not yet arrived as there / is no hurry - stop & / enjoy yourself & there will / be plenty of time - / work goes on pretty well / but the days are / passion hot & I / stick to my chair if / not to my work - we / have all been in Lancastershire / for a few days are / none the better for it / only very tired / come home when you like - a week / later if it is doing you / good to be away & / enjoy yourself - nothing / has happened - nor is going / to happen I hope for / a pig's life is the only / life that is worth / having & no events are / a blessing. so be glad / for once that there is no news. Write again & / tell me about the / Mantegna as ?. / Ever your aff EBJ
Letter to Fairfax Murray 6 71 Dear L. M. Once you drew for me / Some panel curved work at / the S. Kensington which I / meant to use for the organ / in my Chant D'Amour / can you tell me where those / drawings were put. / Your affect. / E.B.J.
L. Bénédite, Deux idéalistes: Gustave Moreau et E. Burne-Jones (Paris, 1899). Critics writing in establishment periodicals tended not to class Burne-Jones and Watts as Symbolists, often opting for the designation of ‘idéaliste’ instead. Richard Thomson suggests that Bénédite, as a state functionary and curator of the Musée du Luxembourg, was especially eager to dissociate Moreau (who had just left his vast personal collection to the nation) from the less salubrious fringes of Symbolism, particularly Lorrain and Huysmans (Thomson 2004, pp. 27-28); this may explain his decision to classify Moreau and Burne-Jones under a heading with more high-minded connotations.