William Morris, a famous 19th-century British textile designer, craftsman, Socialist, and poet, was a prominent and multifaceted figure. His flattened, floral designs were inspired by his love for the 14th- and 15th centuries and generated the Arts and Crafts Movement. Morris briefly worked as a painter and founding member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. In his only surviving oil painting, La Belle Isuelt, Morris depicts the medieval subject, Iseult, from Sir Thomas Mallory’s Le Morte D’Arthur, 1485. Through the theme of Arthurian legend, reference to medieval symbols, wall tapestries, and other motifs, Morris displays his admiration of Medieval themes.
