King Acrisius, The Rubens Version 

Edward Burne-Jones made this pen and ink drawing, titled ‘King Acrisius, The Rubens Version,’ sometime during his career as a leading figure in the second wave of the Pre-Raphaelite movement in England. Burne-Jones here glances back to the Baroque style of the Flemish painter, Peter Paul Rubens, in this image of the mythological King Acrisius. Burne-Jones was a key figure in the British Aesthetic movement, interested in the pursuit of ‘art for art’s sake’ and drawing inspiration from myth, legend, and classical literature. Burne-Jones and his colleagues, like William Morris, saw themselves in opposition to the Victorian art establishment. Burne-Jones was interested in the way art could represent and reimagine the past. When we study the institutional history of art, we can better understand these dialogues across time and how artists participate in them.