Rutsinskaya I.I. Tea Party in British Painting of the Victorian Era

Abstract: For many years Britain has been associated with tea. In spite of being a national symbol of the UK, tea has always been an imported drink, therefore it has been strongly connected to the culture of the country of its origin. The process of tea assimilation in Britain took a long time. It was during the Victorian Era of British history when Eastern (Chinese) allusions were removed from a process of tea consumption. National painting played a significant role in the evolution of tea image. It shaped «visual codes» of British tea and proliferated the image of tea as a symbol of contemporary life. The subject of the research is the 'tea plots' in English genre painting of the middle and the second half of the XIXth century. Their increasing popularity and commonness in the aforesaid period allow to view art as an important instrument of the 'civilizational adoption' of tea by the British culture. Through creating a recognizable visual image of the English tea party with all its social, genre and gender peculiarities, pieces of artwork participated in the process of turning the imported product into the national symbol of the country. The analysis of paintings offered by the author of the article involves not only studying peculiarities of the world of objects depicted therein, historically and culturally determined details of the tea party and etiquette but also defining national stereotypes, norms and values behind them. The author appeals to pictorial sources which allows to extend the basis of the research and study the visual codes, visual stereotypes and visual attitudes to everyday life. Despite the fact that national gastronomical practices have recently attracted many scientists, this topic is studied for the first time in Russian historiography.  

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