The fictional Marcus Sextus, Napoleon pardoning the rebels of Cairo, and Narcissus where he shouldn’t be: disinformation in history painting.
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Perception changed with photography, and we came to interpret blur, lines and other devices as indicating motion.
Motion can be implied against the rules we learn about how the world works. It can also be shown in billowing garments.
One of King Priam’s sons falls in love with a Trojan woman late in the Trojan War. When Hector is about to duel with Achilles, what could possibly go wrong?
Two birds associated with different beliefs: Hera or Juno’s peacocks, and the white dove as a physical manifestation of the Holy Spirit.
Two birds associated with myth: Zeus’s eagle, often used to indicate his presence in disguise, and the symbol of night and wisdom, the owl.
Paintings by William Blake, William Hogarth, Henry Fuseli, Paul Delaroche and others for this popular tragedy and history.
From Blake onwards, dreams often take over the whole view, with the dreamer the only link to reality. Examples from Blake, Rossetti, Hodler and others.
From the Renaissance, by convention dreams were shown as a dream view set within a framing real view. Examples by Raphael, Tintoretto and others.
The last two years of his reign, marred by bad decisions, led to his forced abdication in favour of King Henry IV.
