Art Now and Then: Mythology Rediscovered

Friday, November 2, 2012

Mythology Rediscovered

Danae, 1907-08, Gustave Klimt

Yesterday (previous item, below), I may have given the impression that painting traditional mythology has become largely a thing of the past, and at best, what little that's being done today is mostly "crap." If so, that was not my intention nor is such an impression totally accurate. Having said that, I also have to say, I don't know of a single painter today who routinely paints mythology. Of course, there probably are some, but such work has a very limited audience and even less marketing potential (unless you consider what's called "fantasy" painting to be mythology). However, much as we might think otherwise, mythological painting did not die with the passing of Academicism and the coming of age of Modern Art. It did, however, recede for some fifty years. The Impressionists, and particularly those directly following them, preferred their contemporary world--basically planes, trains, and automobiles. In the following decades, early abstractionists went a step further and jettisoned even that in favor of art about art. But for minor exceptions, it wasn't until the 1920s that any artists again felt the need to make classical references in their work.

Athene, 1898, Gustav Klimt

One of those minor exceptions was Gustave Klimt, the German modern romanticist from the first decades of the 20th century. He often made references to female mythological figures such as Danae (top) and Athene (right) in his highly erotic, highly decorative, yet thoroughly Art Nouveau paintings. His work sought to capture the spirit of his mythological figures rather than to delve into traditional narrative. Except for Klimt and maybe one or two others, it wasn't until the 1920s and 30s when the Italian artist Giorgio de Chirico began to paint his lonely, metaphysical piazzas with their vaguely classical figures and architecture that any artist or group of artists began to once more take seriously classical mythology. Even at that, it was slow in coming back. It was only as de Chirico began to influence the next generation of painters and the Surrealist movement, that artists such as Picasso, Dali, and others began to once more take note of mythical lore in their work.

The Intervention of the Sabine Women
(after David), 1962-63, Pablo Picasso

Pink Minotaur Monitor, Night Guests,
1982, Joe Shannon

But it was not the myths of the previous century that intrigued them, and nearly always, it was work predicated upon a strongly erotic theme. Picasso chose what he called "tribute" pieces such as The Intervention of the Sabine Women (after David) (above, left) dating from the early 1960s. Dali, on the other hand, seems to have embraced classical mythology almost by default in his vehement rejection of abstraction. But in both cases, these two giants of 20th century art were intent upon reinventing mythological painting to fit their own personal needs. Yet their influence can be seen in the work of artists such as the German, Max Beckmann, and the American, Joe Shannon. Beckmann's The Argonauts (below), dating from 1949 revives, for mythological purposes, the traditional Christian format of the triptych, which he later used for several religious works as well. His paintings, with their three separate compartments, seem very much within the narrative tradition of the Academicists, yet stylistically they relate much more closely to Picasso than to Beckmann's German forebears who invented the triptych. Shannon's Pink Minotaur Monitor, Night Guests (above, right), dating from 1982, draws upon the work of both Beckmann (stylistically) and Picasso (subjectively). From Beckmann he derives his rather heavy, idealized figures with their over sized feet and exaggerated physical attributes while borrowing from Picasso his fascination with the bull, which he displays both in "real life" and as seen in a painted TV image. His nude figures seem almost photographic, even pornographic.

The Argonauts, 1949-50, Max Beckmann

Early in his career, even the abstractionist's abstractionist, Jackson Pollock, delved into mythology, though hardly from a classical perspective, as he freely intermingled Native American, Pre-Columbian, and Greek themes. His Wooden Horse (bottom) of 1948 is an example. The drips, splatters, and highly gestural movement of paint on canvas that would later become his trademarks are present in this seminal work; but so too are attached items such as parts of a child's wooden horse which makes reference to the Trojan horse of Greek mythology. The common element Pollock and each of these other artists sought in their revival of painted mythology was not that of their academic predecessors. Unlike David, Ingres, Bouguereau, and others, they no longer needed mythology as a pretext for nude or erotic figures. Instead, they sought to adapt universally known mythological figures and themes to their existing style in such a manner as to add legitimacy--intellect, weight, and a literary element of respect--to their work. So, seen any good minotaurs lately?