National Gallery to host one of most anticipated exhibits of spring 2013

Looking back, over the seismic shifts of early-20th-century art, the Pre-Raphaelite painters of 19th-century England seem guilty of every crime of retrograde aesthetics: They were sentimental and traditional, treacly and decorative. They were obsessed with willowy ginger lads and lasses languishing in historical dress-up, and lavished attention on hyper-precise details of wallpaper, costume and foliage.