In case you were curious about the taste in art of our President-Elect Barack Obama, I learned from the "Two Coats of Paint" blog that Barack Obama's favorite paintings is called Hope, by George Frederic Watts. [At first glance, it is hardly the most comforting of images, with its pea-soup greens and murky greys; indeed, GK Chesterton quipped that Watts might more accurately have called his painting "Despair". But the painting's message of faith in the face of adversity fascinated Wright. "The harpist is sitting there in rags," he preached. "Her clothes are tattered as though she had been a victim of Hiroshima… [yet] the woman had the audacity to hope." The phrase stuck irrevocably in Obama's mind. He adapted it as the title of his rousing address to the Democratic Convention in 2004. In 2006, he used it again, as the title of his second book.]
The Tate Museum of Art that owns Hope, has an interesting explaination about this mysterious piece:
The figure of Hope is traditionally identified by an anchor. In this picture she is blindfolded, seated on a globe and playing a lyre of which all the strings are broken except one. Watts wanted to find a more original approach to symbolism and allegory. But Hope’s attempts to make music here appear futile and several critics argued that the work might have been more appropriately titled Despair. Watts explained that ‘Hope need not mean expectancy. It suggests here rather the music which can come from the remaining chord’.
Interesting to think about the effect and power of "Hope" in the face of the unknown during these complicated times ahead. Discuss.
1 comment:
This painting is very interesting, and even though it does seem bleak, it really seems like a more true/gritty interpretation of hope.
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