William Waterhouse - Hylas and the Nymphs (1896)
In Greek mythology, Hylas was the son of King Theiodamas of the Dryopians. Roman sources such as Ovid state that Hylas’ father was Hercules and his mother was the nymph Melite, or that his mother was the wife of Theiodamas, whose adulterous affair with Heracles caused the war between him and her husband. He gained his beauty from his divine mother and his military prowess from his demigod father.
After Heracles killed Theiodamas in battle for his son, Hylas, he took the boy on as arms bearer and taught him to be a warrior.
John William Waterhouse had many inspirations around him growing up in his father’s art studio. The inspiration he found in classical and pre-Raphaelite artists is also plain to see in his composition of ‘Hylas and the Nymphs’ as well as the very unique stamp he put on this work himself and his fascination with the captivating female form.
Classical Style:
As a young artist Waterhouse was heavily influenced by classical artists such as Alma-Tadema and Lord Leighton. The inspiration he took from these artist and others of the same period is reflected in the theme of this painting, a classical tale, as well as the styling of the characters and the composition.
Alma-Tadema’s painting, ‘A Favorite Custom’ which he painted in 1909, has a completely different story to that of Waterhouse’s work, and yet its main focus is of the two female-nudes at the forefront of the painting, very similar thematically to ‘Hylas and the Nymphs’.
Femme Fatale:
The central character of this story, Hylas, is not the main focus of Waterhouse’s painting. Instead, the viewer is drawn to the central Nymph. Not only does Hylas have his back to the viewer but Waterhouse has created this painting so that we almost feel like we are seeing the vision from Hylas’ perspective.
The inspiration for this type of perspective come from Waterhouse’s obsession with portraying a femme fatale.
CHARLES HERMANS “Circe - The Temptress”
Hermans is best known for his rich and cosmopolitan displays of Parisian society. He studied first in Brussels under the neo-classical painter François-Joseph Navez and Louis Gallait.
In Paris he joined the studio of Swiss artist Charles Gleyre who has taken over the studio of Paul Delaroche in 1843 and taught a number of remarkable young artists, including Claude Monet, Pierre Auguste Renoir, Alfred Sisley and James Abbott McNeill Whistler.
In 1880 Hermans entered a monumental painting at the Salon, Le bal masqué, depicting a ball at the Opera. It gives an energetic portrayal of the exuberant atmosphere of Parisian balls in the second half of the 19th Century.
This painting was heralded as a boisterous and unrestrained rendering of the Opera Ball as Charles Hermans focuses on the sexual undertones, the flirtation between the young men dressed in white tie and the richly costumed women.
William Russell Flint
Moirai
Often known in English as The Fates — were the white-robed incarnations of destiny Their number became fixed at three: Clotho (spinner), Lachesis (alloter) and Atropos (unturnable).
They controlled the metaphorical thread of life of every mortal from birth to death. They were independent, at the helm of necessity, directed fate, and watched that the fate assigned to every being by eternal laws might take its course without obstruction; and Zeus , as well as the other gods and man, had to submit to them.
In the Homeric poems Moira or Aisa , is related with the limit and end of life, and Zeus appears as the guider of destiny.
The three Moirai are daughters of the primeval goddess Nyx (Night), and sisters of Keres (black Fates) , Thanatos (Death) and Nemesis (Indignation).
The Moirai represent a power to which even the gods have to conform . They give men at birth both evil and good moments, and they punish not only men but also gods for their sins.
Thomas Ralph Spence (British, 1855 - 1918)
Sleeping Beauty
The Brothers Grimm is a classic fairytale involving a beautiful princess, enchantment, and a handsome prince. Written as an original literay tale, it was first published by Charles Perrault in Histoires ou contes du temps passé in 1697.
In 1959 the story was made into the 1959 Walt Disney animated film, which draws as much from Tchaikovsky’s ballet (premiered at Saint Petersburg in 1890) as it does from Perrault.
The Brothers Grimm included a variant, Little Briar Rose, in their collection (1812).
It truncates the story as Perrault and Basile told it to the ending now generally known: the arrival of the prince concludes the tale. Some translations of the Grimm tale give the princess the name Rosamond.
The brothers considered rejecting the story on the grounds that it was derived from Perrault’s version, but the presence of the Brynhild tale convinced them to include it as an authentically German tale. Still, it is the only known German variant of the tale, and the influence of Perrault is almost certain.
The Brothers Grimm also included, in the first edition of their tales, a fragmentary fairy tale, The Evil Mother-in-Law. This began with the heroine married and the mother of two children, as in the second part of Perrault’s tale, and her mother-in-law attempted to eat first the children and then the heroine.
Unlike Perrault’s version, the heroine herself suggested an animal be substituted in the dish, and the fragment ends with the heroine’s worry that she can not keep her children from crying, and so from coming to the attention of the mother-in-law. Like many German tales showing French influence, it appeared in no subsequent edition.
Herbert James Draper, “The Lament for Icarus”
Icarus was the son of the inventor Daedalus and a slave named Naucrate. King Minos of Crete imprisoned Daedalus and Icarus in the Labyrinth to punish Daedalus for helping the hero Theseus to kill the monster called the Minotaur and to escape with Minos’ daughter, Ariadne.
Daedalus knew that Minos controlled any escape routes by land or sea, but Minos could not prevent an escape by flight. So Daedalus used his skills to build wings for himself and Icarus. He used wax and string to fasten feathers to reeds of varying lengths to imitate the curves of birds’ wings.
When their wings were ready, Daedalus warned Icarus to fly at medium altitude. If he flew too high, the sun could melt the wax of his wings, and the sea could dampen the feathers if he flew too low.
Once they had escaped Crete, Icarus became exhilarated by flight. Ignoring his father’s warning, he flew higher and higher. The sun melted the wax holding his wings together, and the boy fell into the water and drowned.
Daedalus looked down to see feathers floating in the waves, and realized what had happened. He buried his son on an island which would be called Icaria, and the sea into which Icarus had fallen would ever after be called the Icarian Sea.
Howard Pyle (1853 – 1911) American illustrator and author, primarily of books for young people.
A native of Wilmington, Delaware, he spent the last year of his life in Florence, Italy.
During 1894 he began teaching illustration at the Drexel Institute of Art, Science and Industry (now Drexel University), and after 1900 he founded his own school of art and illustration named the Howard Pyle School of Illustration Art.
Indeed, none of the tales in the Robin Hood book were Pyle’s own invention, with some dating back to the late Middle Ages. Rather, his achievement was in linking them to form a unified, illustrated story. “The Adventure with the Curtal Friar”, for example, ceased to be a stand-alone tale, but was made part of the book’s overall narrative by Pyle in order to reintroduce Friar Tuck, because a co-operative priest was needed for the wedding of outlaw Allan a Dale (Pyle’s spelling of the original Alan-a-Dale) to his sweetheart Ellen.
A number of pirate legends by Pyle, including some of his illustrations, were collected as Howard Pyle’s Book of Pirates, published in 1921, ten years after his death.
BOLESLAW SZANKOWSKI (POLISH 1873-1953)
Gypsy
A member of a nomadic, Caucasoid people who migrated originally from India, settling in various parts of Asia, Europe, and, most recently, North America.
Romani mythology is the myth, folklore, religion, traditions, and legends of the Romani people (also known as Gypsies). The Romanies are a nomadic culture which originated in India during the Middle Ages.
They migrated widely, particularly to Europe. Some legends (particularly from non-Romani peoples) say that certain Romanies are said to have passive psychic powers such as, empathy, precognition, retrocognition, or psychometry.
Other legends include the ability to levitate, travel through astral projection by way of meditation, invoke curses or blessings, conjure/channel spirits, and skill with illusion-casting.
John William Waterhouse Circe Invidiosa 1892 (Jealous Circe)
In Greek mythology, Circe is a minor goddess of magic (or sometimes a nymph, witch, enchantress or sorceress, described in Homer’s Odyssey as “The loveliest of all immortals”, living on the island of Aeaea, famous for her part in the adventures of Odysseus.
By most accounts, Circe was the daughter of Helios, the god of the sun, and Perse, an Oceanid and the sister of Aeetes, the keeper of the Golden Fleece.
Circe transformed her enemies, or those who offended her, into animals through the use of magical potions. She was known for her knowledge of drugs and herbs.
Waterhouse has shown Circe wearing a stunning gown of peacock feathers. The poison matches her dress. It is a luminous turquoise, like a liquid jewel. But this beautiful mixture will cause unimaginable horror and pain to poor innocent Scylla.
Mercifully, the monsterfied girl is eventually turned into a rock, and so her suffering ends. Note that Circe is shown standing on one of her many beasts in thrall, a kind of dog-faced sea creature that hints at what is to come.
Gabriel Joseph Marie Augustin Ferrier (French, 1847-1914), “Little Red Riding Hood”
The story revolves around a girl called Little Red Riding Hood, after the red hooded cape/cloak (in Perrault’s fairytale) or simple cap (in the Grimms’ fairytale) she wears. The girl walks through the woods to deliver food to her sick grandmother.
A wolf wants to eat the girl but is afraid to do so in public. He approaches Little Red Riding Hood and she naïvely tells him where she is going. He suggests the girl pick some flowers, which she does. In the meantime, he goes to the grandmother’s house and gains entry by pretending to be the girl. He swallows the grandmother whole, and waits for the girl, disguised as the grandma.
When the girl arrives, she notices that her grandmother looks very strange. Little Red Riding Hood then says, “What big hands you have!” In most retellings, this colloquy eventually culminates with Little Red Riding Hood saying, “My, what big teeth you have!” to which the wolf replies, “The better to eat you with” and swallows her whole, too.
A hunter, however, comes to the rescue and cuts the wolf open. Little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother emerge unharmed. They fill the wolf’s body with heavy stones. The wolf awakens thirsty from his large meal and goes to the well to seek water, where he falls in and drowns. (Sanitized versions of the story have the grandmother shut in the closet instead of eaten, and some have Little Red Riding Hood saved by the hunter as the wolf advances on her, rather than after she is eaten.)
The tale makes the clearest contrast between the safe world of the village and the dangers of the forest, conventional antitheses that are essentially medieval, though no written versions are as old as that. The original was supposed to be a warning to young women about the sexual appetites of men (and the wolf-like qualities that they possess).
William-Adolphe Bouguereau (November 30, 1825 - August 19, 1905) was a French academic painter. Bouguereau was a staunch traditionalist whose realistic genre paintings and mythological themes were modern interpretations of Classical subjects with a heavy emphasis on the female human body.
Although he created an idealized world, his almost photo-realistic style was popular with rich art patrons. He was very famous in his time but today his subject matter and technique receive relatively little attention compared to the popularity of the Impressionists.
In 1856, he married Marie-Nelly Monchablon and subsequently had five children. By the late 1850’s, he made strong connections with art dealers, particularly Paul Durand-Ruel (later the champion of the Impressionists), who helped clients buy paintings from artists who exhibited at the Salons.
