The Conjuror

The Conjuror, painted in 1847 as part of Millais's student allegorical series, depicts a figure associated with magic, illusion, and the mysterious manipulation of appearances. Among a series concerned with the stages of human life and the personification of arts — Poetry, Music, Youth, Age — a conjuror is a somewhat unexpected addition, suggesting the young Millais's interest in subjects touching on illusion, transformation, and the gap between appearances and reality. The conjuror also had a long history in European genre painting from Bosch onward, representing a figure of deception who exposes the credulity of his audience, and Millais may have been working within this moralising tradition. Norfolk Museums Collections holds this alongside related Victorian works; the Norfolk galleries have a strong regional collecting tradition that includes significant Victorian holdings acquired over many decades.

The subject required Millais to represent a figure in performance — movement, gesture, and the paraphernalia of conjuring — within the academic conventions he was working. The paint handling is careful and controlled, with the conjuror's costume and props rendered with the attention to material character that Millais consistently brought to observed objects even in his student years.