Affinities - II

Anonymous Swedish Designer
Carl Larsson - Nationalmuseum
1992
lithograph
(exhibition poster)
Moderna Museet, Stockholm

Félix Auvray
Return of Ulysses
ca. 1820-30
drawing
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Valenciennes

Jacob Adriaensz Backer
The Four Evangelists
ca. 1640
oil on canvas
Göteborgs Konstmuseum, Sweden

Ferdinand Bol
Ruth and Naomi
ca. 1630-40
drawing
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Massimo Campigli
The Friends
1929
oil on canvas
Moderna Museet, Stockholm

Agostino Carracci after Raffaellino da Reggio
Tobias and the Angel
1581
engraving
Graphische Sammlung, ETH Zürich

Lovis Corinth
Group of Women
1904
oil on canvas
Galerie Neue Meister (Albertinum), Dresden

Dominicus Custos
Woman with Flute and Blind Man
ca. 1590
engraving
Herzog August Bibliothek, Wulfenbüttel

Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg
Group of Figures
ca. 1812-15
drawing
Nasjonalmuseet, Oslo

Alekos Fassianos
Conversation
ca. 1975
colored pencil on paper
National Gallery, Athens

Girolamo da Treviso
Isaac blessing Jacob
ca. 1520-30
oil on panel
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen

Auguste-Alexandre Hirsch
The Muse Calliope teaching Music to the young Orpheus
1865
oil on canvas
Musée d'Art et d'Archéologie du Périgord

Karl Hofer
Boys from Ticino
ca. 1920-25
drawing
Museum Folkwang, Essen

Nicolas Labbé
The Visitation
ca. 1640-43
oil on canvas
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Marseille

Lucas van Leyden
The Visitation
ca. 1516
engraving
Graphische Sammlung, ETH Zürich

workshop of Peter Paul Rubens
Christ Child with young St John the Baptist and Cherubs
ca. 1620-30
oil on panel
Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Chorus of Persian Elders:  Mother, we do not wish to say what would make you either unduly fearful or unduly optimistic.  You should approach the gods with supplications and ask them, if there was anything sinister in what you saw, to ensure that it is averted, but that what was good should be fulfilled for you, for your children, for the community, and for everyone that you care for.  Secondly, you should pour drink-offerings to Earth and to the dead, and propitiate them with this prayer: that your husband Darius, whom you say you saw in the night, should send up to the light, from beneath the earth, blessings for you and your son, but that whatever is contrary to them be kept under the earth, ineffective, in the darkness.  Using my intelligence to prophesy for you, I give you this advice in all good will, and our interpretation of these signs is that things will turn out well for you in every way.

Queen:  Yes, as the first interpreter of the dream you have shown yourself loyal to my son and my house in the very definite words you have spoken.  May what was good indeed be fulfilled!  We shall make all these arrangements as you advise, towards the gods and towards our friends beneath the earth, when we return home.  But there is something I wish to learn, my friends.  Where in the world do they say that Athens is situated?  

Chorus:  Far away, near the place where the Lord Sun declines and sets.

Queen:  And yet my son had a desire to conquer that city? 

– Aeschylus, from Persians (472 BC), translated by Alan H. Sommerstein (2008)