In the autumn of 1848 three young artists reacted against contemporary fashionable painting which they viewed as insipid and lacking in any sincerity or truth to nature.

The three young artists were William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais and Dante Gabriel Rossetti.

William Holman Hunt	John Everett Millais	Dante Gabriel Rossetti

Forming a secret society with four of their friends. . .

• James Collinson
• F.G. Stephens
• Thomas Woolner 
• William Michael Rossetti (brother of Dante Gabriel)
  

They called themselves . . . The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.