If you flip through a standard textbook on the Pre-Raphaelites, it's usually just page after page of guys painting pale, tragic women waiting around in towers. And then you hit Evelyn De Morgan. She completely wrecked that stereotype. De Morgan had zero interest in painting helpless damsels; she painted women with muscle and agency who looked like they could actually win a fight. It’s wild to look at her portfolio because she took these incredibly old, highly traditional Renaissance techniques—think Botticelli-style drapery and bright, expensive pigments—and used them to push straight-up radical politics. We're talking hardcore feminism, deep dives into Spiritualism, and a really intense anti-war stance right when the world was tearing itself apart. She basically infiltrated what was a massive boys' club of an art scene and forced the establishment to take her seriously. She wasn't just some follower trailing behind the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. She took their whole aesthetic, flipped the script on how women were portrayed, and built a massive career entirely on her own terms.

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