![]() The proper understanding of the relations of Othello and Desdemona is equally important with the question of the relations of lago and Othello. Thus Colin has marked here the development of romantic painting style and its origins in the ideas of the previous generation.It is at this point that the second of the great problems of the play emerges. ![]() ![]() The pose of Desdemona is itself homage to Fuseli’s Nightmare. The composition is a direct tribute to Guérin’s Clytemnestra and Agamemnon, shown at the Salon of 1817, with the protagonists, their gender’s reversed, in related poses and the scene likewise lit by candlelight shining through a red curtain. Colin, like Delacroix, was a frequent visitor to the theater and likely saw a production of the play that gave him the ideas for this detail. ![]() It would appear here that Colin has indicated a similar scenario, by showing the Moor’s empty scabbard at his belt and we may assume that he stabbed his wife in the back. The problem with the presentation of this scene on stage has been that it is of course impossible for someone to speak when they have been suffocated, hence 19 th century productions usually had Othello stab the unfortunate Desdemona before Emily entered. Desdemona still struggling with her dying breath, responds to Emilia’s cries “A guiltless death I die (Emilia) O, who hath done this deed? (Desdemona) Nobody, I myself. Here is the very moment when he moves to open the door to Emilia, Desdemona’s loyal maid. After accusing her of infidelity with Cassio, – in a scene during which Desdemona pleads hopelessly for her life, Othello smothers her with the pillow. The scene portrayed is set with the direction “he draws back a curtain, revealing Desdemona asleep in her bed” ( Othello, Act 5, scene 2, introduction). The exquisitely painted Desdemona is finely drawn and delicately colored – as is appropriate for “a maid so tender, (and) fair” (Brabanzio: Othello, Act 1, scene 2). The Othello and Desdemona is a bravura work, faithful to the text, and full of energy and color. A frequent exhibitor at the Salon from 1819 until 1868, he concentrated primarily on subjects from historical or literary sources, while painting a few landscapes and enjoying a reputation as an accomplished portraitist.Ĭolin may first have become interested in depicting Shakespearean subjects when he visited London in 1824 in the company of Delacroix and Bonington. His refined brushwork was particularly suited to the smaller scale historical and literary genre pictures in which both he and his close friend Bonington were pioneers.Īlthough he had several early successes and his Massacre at Chios, exhibited at the same time as Delacroix’s larger work, was a considerable achievement, Colin never attained the fame of either Bonington or Delacroix and, by 1850, seems to have lost momentum, taking up a teaching assignment at the Academy of Nîmes. Colin’s style was generally less robust than Delacroix’s and was later more constrained by academic convention. Early in his career he was in the vanguard of Romantic artistic expression and was the object of similar critical attacks as Delacroix for his choice of subjects, while being praised for his painterly skills. Colin was enrolled in Girodet’s studio, but owes little to this master’s style. Born in the same year as Eugène Delacroix, Colin entered the École des Beaux Arts in 1814, where both he and Delacroix attracted the attention of their teachers, winning drawing and composition prizes.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |