ABSTRACT
The investigation of British art in terms of its international relations is a process that has been gathering pace in recent years. To a certain extent it is the product of new ways of considering the history of art - and the abandonment of some old ones. Changes in taste have certainly played their part in the assessments of British art. The history of art that has been explored in this volume shows how different the perception of British art was in the period under review. Even when, a few years later, French art was able to demonstrate new youth - and decisively outpace the naturalism for which British art had earlier been admired - in the emergence of Impressionism, Britain was still held to offer an exciting alternative; this time in the Pre-Raphaelite movement.
