Warren Brandt Roses and Red Kimono 1985 oil on canvas Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh |
Carl Friedrich Lessing Drapery Study ca. 1830-40 drawing Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio |
Marc Arcis Bust of Marcus Antonius Primus ca. 1674-77 terracotta Musée des Augustins de Toulouse |
Anthonie Blocklandt Adoration of the Shepherds 1583 oil on panel Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest |
Fra Bartolomeo Drapery Study for Kneeling Magdalen ca. 1505-1506 drawing Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam |
Juan de la Huerta Mourner from Tomb of John the Fearless and Margaret of Bavaria ca. 1443-45 alabaster Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio |
Anonymous Italian Artist Portrait of Dorothea Sophie of Neuberg, Duchess of Parma ca. 1710 oil on canvas Galleria Nazionale di Parma |
Jules Chéret Léonie Laporte as a Bacchante ca. 1900 drawing Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts |
workshop of Gianlorenzo Bernini Bust Portrait of Ranuccio II Farnese, 6th Duke of Parma and Piacenza, at age 50 ca. 1680 marble Galleria Nazionale di Parma |
Cigoli (Lodovico Cardi) St James the Lesser ca. 1600 oil on canvas Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart |
Eustache Le Sueur Study of Draped Figure ca. 1653 drawing Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest |
Anonymous Italian Artist Bust of Agrippa 17th century porphyry (head) and alabaster (body) Galleria Borghese, Rome |
Peter Paul Rubens Penitent Mary Magdalen with her sister Martha ca. 1620 oil on canvas Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna |
The Gospel story of Mary and Martha contrasted the dutiful housekeeper Martha with her sister Mary who sat idly drinking in the words of Christ. Mary Magdalen, also present in the Gospels as a penitent prostitute, was not the same Mary as the sister of Martha. However, during the Counter-Reformation painters did begin to represent the Magdalen as identical with the Mary who was the sister of Martha, tempted into this non-scriptural revision by the stronger visual contrast they could create between the "good" Martha (i.e. chaste, but also dull), and the "bad" Mary Magdalen (i.e. promiscuous, but also fascinating).
Hans Bol Drapery Study ca. 1575 drawing Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam |
Anonymous Italian Artist St John the Evangelist 14th century polychromed wood Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia |
To a Shade
If you have revisited the town, thin Shade,
Whether to look upon your monument
(I wonder if the builder has been paid)
Or happier-thoughted when the day is spent
To drink of that salt breath out of the sea
When grey gulls flit about instead of men,
And the gaunt houses put on majesty:
Whether to look upon your monument
(I wonder if the builder has been paid)
Or happier-thoughted when the day is spent
To drink of that salt breath out of the sea
When grey gulls flit about instead of men,
And the gaunt houses put on majesty:
Let these content you and be gone again;
For they are at their old tricks yet.
A man
Of your own passionate serving kind who had brought
In his full hands what, had they only known,
Had given their children's children loftier thought,
Sweeter emotion, working in their veins
Like gentle blood, has been driven from the place,
And insult heaped upon him for his pains,
And for his open-handedness, disgrace;
Your enemy, an old foul mouth, had set
For they are at their old tricks yet.
A man
Of your own passionate serving kind who had brought
In his full hands what, had they only known,
Had given their children's children loftier thought,
Sweeter emotion, working in their veins
Like gentle blood, has been driven from the place,
And insult heaped upon him for his pains,
And for his open-handedness, disgrace;
Your enemy, an old foul mouth, had set
The pack upon him.
Go, unquiet wanderer,
And gather the Glasnevin coverlet
About your head till the dust stops your ear,
The time for you to taste of that salt breath
And listen at the corners has not come;
And gather the Glasnevin coverlet
About your head till the dust stops your ear,
The time for you to taste of that salt breath
And listen at the corners has not come;
You had enough of sorrow before death –
Away, away! You are safer in the tomb.
Away, away! You are safer in the tomb.
– W.B. Yeats (1913)