ABSTRACT
This chapter explores why, in the 1870s, the art of the second-generation Pre-Raphaelites came to represent this new religion and why they were the focus of such an act of genuflection. In order to examine this question, it looks at the acts of love and devotion which the Grosvenor audience displayed before the works of the second-generation Pre-Raphaelites, the critical response to this audience in the popular press and the critical response to specific paintings exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery. At the first Grosvenor Summer Exhibition in 1877, the second-generation Pre-Raphaelites appeared together as a group for the first time, with Burne-Jones at their head. At the first Grosvenor exhibition, the importance of the Pre-Raphaelites' presence was manifest in the arrangement of the West Gallery alone. At the first Grosvenor exhibition, the importance of the Pre-Raphaelites' presence was manifest in the arrangement of the West Gallery alone.
