Painters like Millais perhaps worked outside best, artist admitted (3-11)

'painters' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both people as well as being plural nouns.
Perhaps you can see an association between them that I don't see?

'millais perhaps worked outside best artist admitted' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite see how this works, but
'best' could be 'elite' (elite can mean the very best of a group) and 'elite' is found in the answer.
'artist' could be 'ra' (Royal Academician, member of Royal Academy of Arts) and 'ra' is found in the answer.
an anagram of 'perhaps' is 'prephas' which is located in the left over letters.
This accounts for all the letters.
This explanation may well be incorrect...

'like' is the link.

Can you help me to learn more?