SIR EDWARD BURNE-JONES
(1833 – 1898)
Portrait of Augusta Jones
Provenance
Private Collection
This remarkable red chalk drawing, which has been in a private collection for the last
40 years, was made by Burne-Jones in the mid-1860s. Augusta Jones was his favourite
early model whom he described in his Memorials as ‘a noble looking girl’. She was the
sister of Mary Sandys, the common-law wife of the painter Frederick Sandys (1829-
1904).
Perhaps the most well-known depiction of Augusta Jones is as Princess Sabra in The
Princess in the Garden, painted in 1866, and now in the Musee d’Orsay, Paris. She also
appears in Burne-Jones’s Astrologia (Private Collection) wearing the same billowing
sleeves. A red chalk drawing (32 x 25cm) showing just her head in close-up has recently
been acquired by the National Trust for Wightwick Manor (see Burlington Magazine,
vol. CL111, April, 2011) ,and there is a further less finished drawing (180 x 230mm) in
Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery.
There are few Pre-Raphaelite drawings which show such a deeply personal response to
the sitter. In this drawing, Burne-Jones has combined the beauty and grace of the
model whilst making her a thoughtful and psychologically interesting sitter.