"Ford Madox Brown: The Unofficial Pre-Raphaelite" - the third in a series of publications on Birmingham's unique collection of 19th-century drawings - reassesses the work of this important artist, and reveals his achievements. Older than his contemporaries Holman Hunt, Millais, and pupil Rossetti, and never officially a member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, Ford Madox Brown was nonetheless a central figure within this major art movement. The creator of "Work" and "The Last of England," whose art was marked by an unmistakable originality in the face of critical rejection and market failure, Madox Brown has until now remained a neglected presence in art history.
In this volume Angela Thirlwell, deals with the broader aspects of the artist's developments, setting his works in the context of his life, Tim Barringer, studies the difficulty of categorizing Madox Brown's work, and his refusal to be defined by a particular artistic movement, and Laura MacCulloch, looks specifically at Madox Brown's illustrations, including his undervalued drawings for Shakespeare's "King Lear" and Byron's "The Prisoner of Chillon." Ther is a complete catalogue listing of all 174 drawings, watercolours, designs and archive material by Madox Brown in the BMAG collection.