"Demasquée" (1888) by Akseli Gallen-Kallela, Finnish fin-de-siecle painter (1865-1931).
One of the comments started:
""Lily: Symbolizes purity, chastity, and innocence. White lilies represent the purity of the Virgin Mary. The Angel Gabriel was often painted presenting Mary with a white lily when he announced to her that she would give birth to the Son of God." ...
And I replied:
Actually, everybody, this is a scary pic. The surface belies the deeper meaning. "Unmasked" (demasquee) doesn't just refer to her being naked. It refers to surface beauty and life being unmasked. If you look closely at her, you'll see the marks of age and fatigue. The colours are subdued - and the red of life is muted, the black of death is strong, and there's so much white - and the white lilies are a symbol of death, too. And her skin is white. the guitar is old and used.
But the clincher is on the table behind the highest lily - see the skull?
******
Gallen-Kallela is a favourite painter of mine. You can see some of his work at:
And here's a wild poster that could well have inspired Bulgakov in The Master and Margarita if he'd seen it:
(More on The Master and Margarita on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Master_and_Margarita)
My finger's in quite a bit of the pie)
No comments:
Post a Comment