What especially prompts the posting of the two paintings are the folds of cloth; on the left of the St Jerome, and the drapery hanging from above in the Death of the Virgin, particularly the noumenous power and solemnity of the canopy in the latter.
Sunday, 31 August 2008
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4 comments:
The white cloth to the left of the Jerome not only balances the pale skin of the saint, but supplies the skull with a beard. The canopy in the second painting is as threatening as it is solemn: a softer Sword of Damacles
It certainly could be said to be of an ominous or threatening solemnity. One probably doesn't preclude the other.
It's puzzling how mere drapery can have this power. i saw a great Rembrandt in Prague in February, some minor work or another, can't remember the title, but i found myself mesmerised by the folds of the model's clothing. It wasn't just that it was realistic and i, being talentless, could never come close to it in a million years - there was something else there, very strange.
If the doors of perception were cleansed and all that.
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