Why did Charles Dickens criticize the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1850?

In 1850, the novelist Charles Dickens harshly criticized the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood primarily because he viewed their work as a rejection of established academic ideals of beauty.12

Specifically, Dickens took issue with their uncompromising realism when applied to religious subjects, which he and many others perceived as irreverent or even blasphemous. A focal point of this criticism was the painting Christ in the House of His Parents by John Everett Millais, which Dickens attacked for its lack of idealization and its use of the mundane in a sacred context.13

While Dickens and other critics condemned the group for these stylistic choices, the Pre-Raphaelites found a staunch defender in the influential art critic John Ruskin, who championed their empirical accuracy and sincerity.12