Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1st Baronet (28 August 1833 – 17 June 1898) was a
British artist and
designer closely associated with the later phase of the
Pre-Raphaelite movement, who worked closely with
William Morris on a wide range of decorative arts as a founding partner in
Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co. Burne-Jones was closely involved in the rejuvenation of the tradition of
stained glass art in Britain; his stained glass works include the windows of
St. Philip's Cathedral, Birmingham,
St Martin in the Bull Ring, Birmingham,
Holy Trinity Church, Sloane Square, Chelsea,
St Martin's Church in
Brampton,
Cumbria (the church designed by
Philip Webb),
St Michael's Church, Brighton,
All Saints, Jesus Lane,
Cambridge,
Christ Church, Oxford and in St. Anne's Church, Brown Edge, Staffordshire Moorlands. Burne-Jones's early paintings show the heavy inspiration of
Dante Gabriel Rossetti, but by the 1860s Burne-Jones was discovering his own artistic "voice". In 1877, he was persuaded to show eight oil paintings at the
Grosvenor Gallery (a new rival to the
Royal Academy). These included
The Beguiling of Merlin. The timing was right, and he was taken up as a herald and star of the new
Aesthetic Movement.