Rossetti's Price Tag of £7 Million!

Pandora by Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1871

I was very excited to discover that at Sotheby's Sale of British and irish Art on 22nd May 2014 a painting of Jane Morris as Pandora, by Dante Gabriel Rossetti is going to be auctioned.  It is estimated to be sold for between £5m-£7m.

What fascinated me is that the question of sex between Rossetti and William Morris's wife, Jane is still newsworthy enough to be included in articles about the sale of the painting - this is the story of our musical.

The painting was not included in the Tate Britain's landmark show about the Victorian Avante-Garde.  But the success of the show was undoubted and its subsequent travel to Washington and Moscow shows the increasing popularity of the PRB.  Simon Toll the British and Irish Art Specialist at Sotheby's said recently: "what we've noticed is that the Pre-Raphaelites have suddenly become a lot more internationalised.  We've now got a lot more interested collectors from America and Russia."

When I went off to the States to go to a show of new musical songs, which included one of our Possessed songs, I went to the Delaware Gallery and discovered that it was really only the impressionists that the American's had taken to their hearts at the turn of the Century and the Delaware Gallery was one of the few that housed Pre-Raphaelites paintings in the States.  It looks as if the tide is turning at last.  Which is good for our pre-Raphaelite show that tells the story of Jane Morris, her husband William Morris and lover Dante Gabriel Rossetti.