Preview

Gothic Nightmares

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
528 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Gothic Nightmares
Gothic Nightmares
Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination at Tate Britain 15th February- 1st May 2006

The exhibition is divided amongst eight rooms, a number of artists,

work, such as Henry Fuseli, James Barry, Joseph Wright of Derby,

Catherine Blake, Philippe Jaques de Loutherbourg display their work collectivly. This collective exhibition including many great artists is an interesting way of showing their work, acting like a

whole installation.

The main focus of the instalment targets gothic stories, poems ,

ghouls, ideas of magic and all things involving terror, love

romance, passion. This ground breaking series of paintings

steered the public away from traditional and renaissance art and

introduced sex, horror and violence.

Focusing on Henry Fuseli his work appears throughout eight

rooms. “The Nightmare” for example holds great importance as it

depicts the time. “The Nightmare” is an oil painting on canvas

stretching 101.6x126.7cm wide painted in 1781 and has been

copied by many artists throughout time. Why does this image

create such impact? The public were shocked with this strong,

venerable painting which left Fuseli open to criticism

The powerful, disturbing image conjures up feelings of voyeurism,

and by mixing horror with sex the image haunts the viewer. It has

been argued that this painting holds the key of Fusilis’ own sexual

desires sparking debates between historians and psychologists.

The woman featured here is thought to have been Anna Landolt a

women whom Fuseli had a strong sexual fascination for. If this is

true this information can help us find a direct insight to Fuselis’

desires. The expression on her face is a telling one she looks

tortured but more overpowering than that, there is a sense of

euphoria and sexual gratification.

There are many ideas to what the painting means.

Why is the imp, also known as Mara, which is seen as

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Gentileschi is a second generation Italian artist who demonstrates tenebrism in the form of candlelight that is placed on a table. The heroic figure, Judith within the painting is blocking the light with her hand thusly casting a shadow onto her face. This illustration seems to project the intention that Judith is hiding from unforeseen dangers just out of sight. Gentileschi’s oil canvas creation is 72 ½ X 55 ¾ inches in size and is an “expressive media tool” (253) with the use of brilliant colors, detailing in the clothing, lighting, and shadowing. It is a great asset for the artist to paint with passion and imagination as well as realistic views.…

    • 506 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The first piece I will analyze is Frida Kahlo’s “Henry Ford Hospital” that was her very first time painting on metal, in 1932 after a tragic event that occurred. On July 4th, 1932 Frida Kahlo suffered a miscarriage in the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit. In this disturbing work, Kahlo paints herself lying on her back in the bed after a tragic miscarriage she encountered. She is nude, and the sheets beneath her body are bloody and a large tear falls from her left eye. The bed and its sad inhabitant float in the abstract space circled by six images relating to the miscarriage. All of the images are tied to blood-red filaments that she holds towards her stomach, as if they were umbilical cords.…

    • 953 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    While the theories on the artist intent are of plenty, there is no mistaking that this piece provokes deeper contemplation on the depiction of beauty and the power of “ugly” imagery in this painting. One can argue that over vast time periods and amongst culture the defined interpretation of beauty has seen many profound depictions and interpretations displayed in infinite works of “beautiful” art. We must ask ourselves, can only works of “beauty” be aesthetically pleasing to the eye or can we find it in a variety of work through…

    • 627 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Social and Historical Effects Responsible for the Conception of the Fantastic and Supernatural in Gothic Horror…

    • 2536 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Art 101 Week 1 Assignment

    • 582 Words
    • 3 Pages

    An artist can create art work through a creative process. An element of this process is critical thinking. Artists’ creativity process begins with seeing. It then goes from seeing to imagining and from imagining to making (Sayre, 2009). This essay will provide an explanation of artists’ roles. The essay will also include two chosen works of art, one of which embodies the role of the artist and the other holds symbolic significance requiring the application of iconography.…

    • 582 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    Gombrich, E. H. The Story of Art. 15th edition. All Saints Street, London: Phaidon Press Limited, 1999. Print…

    • 1341 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    In the 19th Century some writers became fascinated with the Gothic genre about the ‘supernatutral’ and concepts of evil. The mood was always gloomy and shadowy. There was always a mysterious male character that dwelt in an eerie castle that is dark, full of strange shadows and is labyrinthine and confusing. The layout is…

    • 2108 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Art 101 Chapter2

    • 269 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The reaction of the public was that of not understanding what the artists were trying to convey. They did not understand that Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase, was based on the concept of motion. In Michelangelo’s David he was making a political statement. In both works of art, part of what viewers found objectionable about them was that they (the public) did not understand what the works represented. In Michelangelo’s David, the public saw nudity. Other people saw politics and religion were being attacked. In Duchamps painting, the public I think, partially responded to the paintings name, and they did not understand that the painting was not actually of a nude person but was a “series of photographs by Etienne-Jules Marey, representing motion. The objects in the photographs were fully clothed. Etienne-Jules Marey’s photographs that went on to bring about the invention of the motion picture” (Sayre, p. 45, 2010). When I first looked at the painting of Nude Descending a Staircase, I did not see anything in it that gave me any idea of what the picture was about. On looking closer and reading the information about it, my opinion changed. I learned that his painting did have meaning, and that it had nothing to do with nude people. The motion pictures came from the work of Etienne-Jules Marey, and Duchamp saw the meaning and importance of his work.…

    • 269 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Kehinde Wiley Analysis

    • 652 Words
    • 3 Pages

    More often than not, it shows a solitary figure, an attractive man in his 20s, enacting a scene from an old-master painting. Dressed in contemporary garb — a hooded sweatshirt, perhaps, or a Denver Broncos jersey — the man might be crossing the Swiss Alps on horseback with the brio of Napoleon or glancing upward, prophet-style, golden light encircling his head.In layman’s terms, his art is a skilled remix. He rearranges racial power dynamics, conceptions of beauty, gender, and “the gaze.” It makes us think about pop iconography and the history of portraiture” Deborah, S (2015, January 28) Kehinde Wiley Puts a Classical Spin on His Contemporary Subjects The New York…

    • 652 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    3. Geoff has a written agreement with Huck. To accomplish the objectives of this relationship, Geoff's authority can…

    • 1177 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Baltimore Art Museum

    • 1051 Words
    • 5 Pages

    The artist utilized oil and multiple layers of gesso on canvas to create his three dimensional piece of art. The Dancer At Pigalle’s represents a woman who dances in the spotlight on a stage. Her dress is spinning around in a circular flow. In this work, Servini is using a futurist style of painting. I have a feeling that I am inside the stage watching this woman performing ballet dancing. The canvas is developed with layers of plaster to be able to represent the dancer’s motion and dress by projecting them out into the viewer’s land. Light and environment act concurrently on the forms of movement. The work is a colorful representation of the body and the cloth of the woman as depicted. Her dress is pink and is printed with brown hearts. Her shoes are brown. She has black hair. While the painting does not reflect the real mood of the dancer, the bright colors and the gestures that the artist used on this painting reveals the happiness of this…

    • 1051 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Frankenstein and Terror

    • 935 Words
    • 4 Pages

    A classic gothic novel emphasises fear and terror. It has the presence of the supernatural, the placements of events within a distant time and an unfamiliar and mysterious setting. Romantic writer Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein conforms to these conventional ‘classic’ Gothic traits as well as to the modern conceptions of what is considered as Gothic. Shelley’s Frankenstein is host to a range of significant gothic elements, evident through Victor’s creation of the gigantic creature, the dark setting of the novel, set in places of gloom and horror, and the disempowered portrayal of females, in which women are threatened by the tyranny of males and are often in distress. Omens and visions are also evident in the novel, further enhancing the Gothicism found in the novel. Frankenstein is defined as a Gothic novel through the many Gothic aspects it features. The connections, and relevance it has to today’s modern society and the lessons that can be learned from it, is what classifies it as being classic.…

    • 935 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “The Wandering” by Maureen Hayes and “The Leaving” by Budge Wilson are two stories that took place in major cities in Canada in the late 1900s. Both stories showed love and caring traits between the daughter and the mother, and they demonstrated their traits through their actions when under external and internal conflicts.…

    • 591 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Going to the museum is one of my favorite things to do. I just acquired this hobby last year, when I took my first art class. Since then, I have been to many museums in Baltimore, New York and the DC area, however, the Walters Museum is by far my favorite. I looked forward to going again, and reacquainting myself with my favorite art pieces, as well as doing the assignment.…

    • 1477 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    From 1901 to 1904, a series of paintings came into life, all of them rendered in blue and dark green occasionally warmed by other colors. The characters and subject matter of paintings were starkly stern, doleful, gaunt, austere, and mournful and so on. Most of the characters were recluses, prisoners, poverty stricken, prostitutes, beggars, drunk or the characters of melancholies or hopelessness. Their faces, positions, motions as presented were always unsmiling as if they were being haunted,…

    • 1600 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays

Related Topics