William Dyce as a Painter of Biblical Subjects

Abstract

Considering the fecundity of William Dyce's imagination, his breadth of knowledge and experience, and the variety of media in which he worked, it is a surprise to discover that his choice of subject in easel painting was very limited.1 With the exception of The Highland Ferryman,2 Dyce painted no subjects that might be described as genre or “fancy” paintings. For literary sources Dyce rarely looked further afield than Shakespeare, Dante, or Scott. His reputation as a subject painter rests on a series of paintings of the Madonna, Christ and his immediate relatives,3 a number of carefully-chosen Old Testament subjects, and a collection of paintings that have hitherto been considered primarily as landscapes but in which there is unquestionably an important biblical content.