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<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/sir-john-everett-millais-bt-379" aria-label="More by Sir John Everett Millais, Bt" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Sir John Everett Millais, Bt</a>
Vale Rest
Presented by Sir Henry Tate 1894
adults
agriculture and fishing
agriculture, gardening & fishing
architecture
birth to death
birth to death
death - coffin shaped cloud
digging
evening
grave
gravestone / tomb
graveyard
literature and fiction
mortality
nun
objects
people
pick axe
places
religious
religious and ceremonial
rosary
Scotland
Scottish folklore
society
spade
symbols and personifications
tales, legends and traditional
times of the day
tools and machinery
townscapes / man-made features
tree
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<p>Stirred by the spirituality and yearning in Mendelssohn’s song ‘Ruhetal’, here Millais’s theme is death, signified by the presence of the grave, skull and funerary wreaths, and in the intense and solemn colours of a graveyard touched with the last rays of a setting sun. Viewers are invited to contemplate their own mortality through the preparation of the new grave in the foreground and the nun who gazes out towards them. Despite the pain and sadness in death, the title offers hope that it will bring repose from life’s cares and an infinite contentment.</p><p><em>Gallery label, March 2010</em></p>
painting oil paint canvas
29 August 2001 – 25 July 2005
2005-07-25
29 August 2001
2001-08-29
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2001-08-29
Art and Victorian Society
Collection based display
26 September 2007 – 26 October 2008
2008-10-26
26 September 2007 – 13 January 2008
2008-01-13
2007-09-26
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
15 February 2008 – 18 May 2008
2008-05-18
2008-02-15
Van Gogh Museum (Amsterdam, Netherlands)
http://www.vangoghmuseum.nl/
7 June 2008 – 17 August 2008
2008-08-17
2008-06-07
Kitakyushu Municipal Museum of Art (Kitakyushu-City, Japan)
30 August 2008 – 26 October 2008
2008-10-26
2008-08-30
Bunkamura Museum of Art (Tokyo, Japan)
2007-09-26
Millais
Exhibition
15 February 2008 – 26 October 2008
2008-10-26
15 February 2008 – 18 May 2008
2008-05-18
2008-02-15
Van Gogh Museum (Amsterdam, Netherlands)
http://www.vangoghmuseum.nl/
7 June 2008 – 17 August 2008
2008-08-17
2008-06-07
Kitakyushu Municipal Museum of Art (Kitakyushu-City, Japan)
30 August 2008 – 26 October 2008
2008-10-26
2008-08-30
Bunkamura Museum of Art (Tokyo, Japan)
2008-02-15
Millais
Loan-out
18 August 2009 – 14 November 2010
2010-11-14
18 August 2009 – 14 November 2010
2010-11-14
2009-08-18
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2009-08-18
Sublime
Collection based display
12 September 2012 – 31 January 2014
2014-01-31
10 June 2013 – 22 September 2013
2013-09-22
2013-06-10
State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts (Moscow, Russia)
25 January 2014 – 6 April 2014
2014-04-06
2014-01-25
Mori Arts Centre (Tokyo, Japan)
19 April 2014 – 13 July 2014
2014-07-13
2014-04-19
Palazzo Chiablese (Turin, Italy)
2012-09-12
Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant-Garde
Exhibition
17 February 2013 – 31 August 2014
2014-08-31
10 June 2013 – 13 October 2013
2013-10-13
2013-06-10
State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts (Moscow, Russia)
25 January 2014 – 6 April 2014
2014-04-06
2014-01-25
Mori Arts Centre (Tokyo, Japan)
19 April 2014 – 13 July 2014
2014-07-13
2014-04-19
Palazzo Chiablese (Turin, Italy)
2013-02-17
Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant-Garde
Loan-out
26 March 2015 – 27 May 2020
2020-05-27
26 March 2015 – 21 June 2015
2015-06-21
2015-03-26
Museo Nacional de Arte (Mexico City, Mexico)
18 July 2015 – 18 October 2015
2015-10-18
2015-07-18
Pinacoteca do Estado (São Paulo, Brazil)
2015-03-26
British Landscape
Tate partnerships & programmes
14 December 2018 – 19 September 2021
2021-09-19
14 December 2018 – 28 April 2019
2019-04-28
2018-12-14
National Gallery of Australia (Canberra, Australia)
19 June 2019 – 6 October 2019
2019-10-06
2019-06-19
Palazzo Reale (Milan, Italy)
13 May 2021 – 19 September 2021
2021-09-19
2021-05-13
Hungarian National Gallery (Budapest, Hungary)
2018-12-14
Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood
Tate partnerships & programmes
The Vale of Rest
support: 1029 × 1727 mm
frame: 1423 × 2102 × 133 mm
Presented by <a href="/search?gid=999999962" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Sir Henry Tate</a> 1894
<p>Of all the pictures that Millais created, this was his favourite. The title and subtitle, 'Where the weary find repose', both come from Mendelssohn's part-song 'Ruhetal' from <i>Sechs Lieder</i>, Opus 59, no.5.  Millais heard his brother William singing the song and felt it suited the picture perfectly.

</p><p>The picture was conceived as a <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/pendant" title="Glossary definition for 'Pendant'"><span>pendant</span></a> to <i>Spring</i> (1856-9, The Lady Lever Art Gallery, National Museums Liverpool). Whereas the earlier picture only hints at mortality, here the theme is made explicit.  The nun on the left is digging a grave, which is positioned in such as way that the viewer appears to be in it alongside her.  The second nun's rosary has a skull attached to it.  In the background a coffin-shaped cloud - a harbinger of death, according to Scots legend - appears in the evening sky.

</p><p>A nun features in an earlier <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/d/drawing" title="Glossary definition for 'Drawing'"><span>drawing</span></a>, <i>St Agnes Eve</i> of 1854 (private collection), and according to Millais' wife, Effie,  'It had long been Millais' intention to paint a picture with nuns in it' (J.G. Millais, <i>The Life and Letters of Sir John Everett Millais</i>, vol.1, 1899, pp.328-30, quoted in Parris 1994, p.175).  The idea for the picture occurred to him on honeymoon in Scotland in 1855.  As Effie explains, 'On descending the hill by Loch Awe, from Inverary, he was extremely struck with its beauty, and the coachman told us that on one of the islands were the ruins of a monastery.  We imagined to ourselves the beauty of the <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/picturesque" title="Glossary definition for 'Picturesque'"><span>picturesque</span></a> features of the Roman Catholic religion' (ibid., quoted in Parris 1994, p.175).

</p><p>It was another three years before Millais began work on this <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/painting" title="Glossary definition for 'Painting'"><span>painting</span></a>.  One October evening, he was so taken by the beauty of the sunset that he fetched a large <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/canvas" title="Glossary definition for 'Canvas'"><span>canvas</span></a> and set to work immediately. Following the <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/pre-raphaelite" title="Glossary definition for 'Pre-Raphaelite'"><span>Pre-Raphaelite</span></a> aesthetic of truth to nature, he painted the bulk of the picture, including the figures, in the open air. The setting - excluding the tombstones, but including the terrace, shrubs and the wall in the background, with poplars and oak trees behind it - was Effie's family's garden at Bowerswell, Perth.  Effie recalled, 'The sunsets were lovely for two or three nights, and he dashed the work in, softening it afterwards in the house, making it, I thought, even less purple and gold than when he saw it in the sky.  The effect lasted so short a time that he had to paint like lightning' (ibid., quoted in Parris, 1994, p.175). The grave and gravestones were painted some months later at Kinnoull old churchyard in Perth. 

</p><p><b>Further reading:<br/></b>Leslie Parris, <i>The Pre-Raphaelites</i>, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1984, reprinted 1994, pp.175-6, reproduced p.176, in colour.<br/>Elizabeth Prettejohn, <i>The Art of the Pre-Raphaelites</i>, London 2000, pp.250-1, reproduced p.250, in colour.

</p><p>Frances Fowle<br/>December 2000</p>
Summary
2005-09-15T00:00:00
summary
SHORT_TEXT
<div><p><span>Stirred by the spirituality and yearning in Mendelssohn’s song ‘Ruhetal’, here John Everett Millais’s theme is death, signified by the presence of the grave, skull and funerary wreaths, and in the intense and solemn colours of a graveyard touched with the last rays of a setting sun. We are invited to contemplate our own mortality through the preparation of the new grave in the foreground and the nun who gazes out towards them. Despite the pain and sadness in death, the title offers hope that it will bring repose from life’s cares and an infinite contentment.</span></p></div>
Online caption
2024-04-22T00:00:00
online-caption
ONLINE_CAPTION
adults agriculture and fishing agriculture, gardening & fishing architecture birth to death birth to death death - coffin shaped cloud digging evening grave gravestone / tomb graveyard literature and fiction mortality nun objects people pick axe places religious religious and ceremonial rosary Scotland Scottish folklore society spade symbols and personifications tales, legends and traditional times of the day tools and machinery townscapes / man-made features tree UK countries and regions woman work and occupations