We talked about Gauguin's Spirit of the Dead are Watching (1892) a few weeks ago in class. Today in another class, we discussed the same image. Apparently the intention of the painting is very close to what we all inferred in class!! Gauguin intended for the audience to question which one is the spirit and who is the subject of the painting. Art historians question who is "watching" who. Interestingly, however, the woman on the bed was one of Gauguin's mistresses. She was 13 years old and the facial expression that she is painted with was a common expression that she made when she was frightened. Further, the textiles we see, the phosphorus yellow, are colors of the dead spirits. These colors are seen at funerals and exist to recall the dead. The spirit in the background is actually an old woman.
That is sooooo interesting. Although some of what we discussed in class still held true, I think that it is interesting that the person we thought was a man is actually an old woman. I think that in it self can lead to a lot of different interpretations than what we had come up with.
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