Spencer Stanhope initially trained under G.F. Watts and accompanied him to Italy in 1853. This visit had a profound effect on Stanhope, and the landscapes of Italy infiltrated into his practice, forming the backgrounds to many of his allegorical paintings, including the present work. In 1857, he was invited by Rossetti to work on the Oxford Union murals alongside both Rossetti and Burne-Jones, both of whom deeply influenced him and cultivated his interest in Pre-Raphaelite subject matter and ideals. Despite this comradery, Stanhope’s ill health, meant that he began to spend his winters in Italy. In 1873, he bought Villa Nuti, just outside Florence and from 1880, he settled there permanently, remaining there until his death twenty-eight years later.
The present work was previously sold as Dante and Beatrice in 1975 and 1989, though it is unclear as to which episode it may represent. The Vita Nuova details that Dante and Beatrice only have an age gap of one year. However, in this painting, ‘Dante’ is considerably older than ‘Beatrice’ and is stooped, with white hair, which discounts the Vita Nuova. Therefore, it is possible that the picture instead represents the Commedia and the couple’s meeting in Purgatorio, though notably this takes place in the Garden of Eden and not in Florence, as Stanhope suggests in his painting. Perhaps Stanhope leaves the identification purposefully ambiguous, so as to challenge the viewer.
What is also notable is the close similarity of these two central characters to a pair of figures in Spencer Stanhope's The Waters of Lethe by the Plains of Elysium (c.1880, Manchester Art Gallery). The figures in this painting are world-weary pilgrims on their way to the river of forgetfulness; as the waters of Lethe wipe the memories of those that swim in it. This large painting features a character of a stooped man and a woman in the foreground that mirrors the clothing and posture of the figures in the present lot. The present painting may evoke the beginning of the long journey that pilgrims take from their cities to the river Lethe.
Though the subject matter of this painting is unclear, Stanhope was heralded for his allegorical images, and in its purest meaning, this painting is suggestive of the unstoppable path of time and its effect on, ‘Age and Beauty.’
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