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Annotated Art Essay 1
Subject vs. Theme:
Paintings of Oedipus and the Sphinx
by Ingres and Moreau
© 2005 by Dianne Durante. All rights
reserved.
May not be reproduced without written permission of the author.
Images
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, Oedipus and the Sphinx, 1808 (Louvre)
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http://www.english.uga.edu/nhilton/lexis_complexes/ingres3.html - a good scan
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http://www.abcgallery.com/I/ingres/ingres6.html - not too bad, although a bit less sharp than the one above
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http://www.artprints-on-demand.co.uk/noframes/ingres/oedipus_sphinx.htm - colors too dark (compare the amount of detail in the upper right with what appears in the first link)
Gustave Moreau, Oedipus and the Sphinx, 1864 (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
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http://www.artcyclopedia.com/masterscans/l61.html - an excellent scan
Subject vs. Theme in a Work of Art
Look at these two paintings of Oedipus and Sphinx, one by Ingres and the other by Moreau. Do you think the artists had the same view of how Oedipus is reacting to the Sphinx? Did they have the same view of who’s in control? Did they have the same view of what the outcome of the confrontation will be?
Clearly there’s more to these paintings than the specific story being shown. The subject or story is very often the same as the title of the painting: Girl with a Pearl Earring, The School of Athens, The Death of Marat. In the Ingres and Moreau paintings, the subject is the Greek myth of Oedipus meeting the Sphinx, a monstrous creature (part woman, part lion, part bird) that kills any passerby who can't correctly answer her riddle.
The theme, on the other hand, is more abstract: it's the message the painting conveys about man and the world he lives in. In the Ingres painting, the theme is a man confidently confronting a death-dealing monster. Ingres implies that man can succeed, despite dire threats to his existence. Moreau, on the other hand, shows a man immobile and expressionless in the very clutches of the monster, which implies that the world is full of terrible things that man is too helpless to battle.
How do these two artists convey such different ideas about the same story? By a combination of telling details. Among them:
- The position of the Sphinx: In Ingres she's subsidiary, off to the side and in shadow. In Moreau the Sphinx is more prominent than Oedipus. She's not only shown in painstaking detail (look at the wings) and in full light, but has actually latched onto Oedipus’s chest.
- The expression of Oedipus: In Ingres he’s focused on the task at hand (answering the riddle). In Moreau, despite the imminent danger, Oedipus is expressionless.
- The anatomy and pose of Oedipus: Ingres’ Oedipus is muscular, and is posed with geometrical precision. Notice the triangles and right angles formed by his knees, elbows and torso. The muscles of Moreau’s Oedipus aren’t nearly as well developed, and he’s standing with an elegant but motionless sway.
- Props: From the Sphinx’s pit in Ingres one foot protrudes, plus a skull and a ribcage. In Moreau, the pit contains a dead foot, the ends of several bones, and a hand that looks as if it 's trying to claw its way out: a gruesome detail.
- Setting: Ingres’s Oedipus is in a cave, but bright light floods in from the left, and at the right, through a high cleft, blue sky and a distant city are a reminder that a safe and beautiful world exists beyond the monster's lair. The man who appears to be fleeing makes Oedipus's situation less solitary. In Moreau, the rocks surrounding Oedipus are craggy and uninhabited, and the sky is a murky, cloudy bluish-gray.
In future essays, I’ll discuss how to systematically work out the theme of a painting. But meanwhile, you might be asking: why study the theme, as opposed to the subject, the style, or the underlying philosophy?
Identifying the theme is necessary to understand the meaning of the work of art; by definition, it is the meaning (the abstract, fundamental meaning) of the work. If you only go as far as saying that these Oedipus paintings are about men facing monsters, you haven’t “gotten” them. “Getting” them means figuring out what the artist's take on that situation is.
To decide if a work is good or bad as art, you have to know the theme, since esthetic evaluation depends on how well all the details work together to convey the theme.
To decide if a work is true or false philosophically, you have to know what the theme is, and then judge whether the ideas it presents correspond with reality or not.
In many cases, you even need to know the theme in order to understand your own reaction to a work of art. The theme is usually what you react to, even when you can’t state it explicitly.
In short, knowing the theme is essential in order to discuss a work in detail. Without it, you'll end up wallowing in lists of concrete details and free associations.
Further Information
Ayn Rand defined theme as "the summation of a novel's abstract meaning." For more, read "Basic Principles of Literature" in The Romantic Manifesto and "Theme and Plot" in The Art of Fiction.
For other examples of identifying the theme and/or sense of life in a work of art, see my essays on Rowlings' Harry Potter series, MacMonnies' Nathan Hale, and Vermeer's Geographer.
For more on Ingres, a 19th-century French Neoclassicist, listen to my lecture on him, available through the Ayn Rand Bookstore (www.AynRandBookstore.com ).
Gustave Moreau (1826-1898), a Symbolist, is most famous as the teacher of Matisse. Of his 7-feet-high Jupiter and Semele, 1890-95 (http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/fnart/art/19th/moreau/moreau_js01.jpg ), he wrote: “To anyone who can interpret material works of art even a little, the sense of this painting is extremely clear and limpid.” Yeah, sure. He also said, “Do you believe in God? I believe only in Him, not in what I touch, not in what I see, but only in what I feel: my mind, my reason seem to me ephemeral and of a suspect reality. Only my inner sentiments seem eternal and incontestably certain.” Moreau was one of the first French artists to reject reason so explicitly in favor of feelings.
Just for the sake of weirdness: try to figure out what's happening in Francis Bacon, Oedipus and the Sphinx after Ingres, 1983, at http://artchive.com/artchive/B/bacon/bacon_oedipus.jpg.html .
Related topics in future essays
If you want one of these to appear sooner rather than later, email comments@forgottendelights.com .
- Types of evaluation: esthetic, historical, emotional, philosophical
- Examination in more detail of use of color, texture, light & shadow, composition
- How do you determine the theme of a work of art?
- Art theories in 19th-c. France, on style vs. subject, training of artists, judging art, and role of reason in art
- Ingres: his art and his theory
- Ingres vs. Delacroix: Neoclassical vs. Romantic painting ca. 1824
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