The red that lasts hundreds of years without fading, but it’s a highly toxic salt of mercury. Used in European paintings from the Romans to the late 19th century.
Tintoretto
Perseus and Andromeda, the death of Medusa, Proserpine abducted by Pluto to Hades, weaving contest between Minerva and Arachne, Lycians turned into frogs, Marsyas flayed, Jason and the Golden Fleece, and the origins of Theseus.
The scales of justice, prominent on many courts of law, and Vedders’ warning of corrupt legislation, for weighing souls entering paradise, or apples in a Brittany market.
Plague ravaged cities across Europe and much of the world, cholera came from contaminated water supplies, then there were influenza and tuberculosis.
Parrots as extras in myths, witnessing Eve taking the apple from the serpent, and as companions to a succession of beautiful women.
From the way of the cross, ascending Calvary, to the Crucifixion, descent from the cross, pietà, and entombment.
From Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem, through the Last Supper, to his trials and crowning with thorns.
From Dürer’s groundbreaking hare to the fable of the hare and the tortoise, a hidden hare in a well-known Turner and a white rabbit for the first of the month?
Jupiter’s bundle of thunderbolts that have survived into computer technology, lightning in great floods, in the destruction of Tyre, and the three witches in Macbeth.
One for sorrow, two for joy, according to the rhyme. Magpies play cameo roles in several major paintings, as shown here.
The Eclectic Light Company 