On a summer afternoon in 1885 the great Pre-Raphaelite painter, Sir John Everett Millais, saw his curly-headed little grandson, Willie James, blowing soap bubbles in a velvet suit, induced him to pose for his portrait in return for a series of fairy stories. Before the portrait was finished, methodical Painter Millais found it necessary to have an iridescent glass sphere especially blown so that he could copy the tints of a soap bubble. The canvas created a mild artistic scandal when it was sold to Lever Bros. Ltd. for Pear's soap advertising. As...
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