Study for the Head of Mary Magdalene in 'The Morning of the Resurrection'

This preparatory study for the head of Mary Magdalene in The Morning of the Resurrection is held at Worcester College, Oxford. Burne-Jones worked on The Morning of the Resurrection over many years, and surviving studies like this one reveal his sustained process of refining figure type, expression, and painterly handling before committing to the large final canvas. Mary Magdalene's presence at the Resurrection was theologically significant: she was the first witness to the risen Christ and the first to carry the news. Her expression at that moment — recognition, wonder, transformed grief — was the emotional and theological crux that Burne-Jones needed to get exactly right. The study format reveals the concentrated attention he gave to individual faces before integrating them into complex multi-figure compositions.

Head studies in oil allow investigation of expression, light direction, and colour harmony independent of compositional context. Burne-Jones's characteristic face — the heavy-lidded, tilted, inwardly absorbed expression of the Aesthetic ideal — is tested and refined here. The handling is relatively loose by the standards of his finished works, with brushwork visible in the modelling of flesh and the suggestion of hair.