‘Isis’ Fingertips: the Symbolist use of Starry Skies’ presentation on congres: ‘The Symbolist Movement’, University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana
Abstract:
Isis’ fingertips: the Symbolist use of starry skies.
Liesbeth Grotenhuis
Shus, Shus! Let’s be quit to listen to the world wisdom, as the woman with a Prussian blue veil suggests with her gesture of silence. Lucien Levy Duhrmer places her against a Prussian blue sky since the hours that the firmament turns dark are most quiet. The effect even changed the palette of the Belgium Symbolist painters to a more monochromic use. Beside, Diderot states that ‘Ruins in the light of the setting sun are more beautiful than during early dawn’. The effect shall be discussed in view of Merson’s painting of the holy Family that rests near a Sphinx in the desert that he executed during both nighttime as in a ruddy raising sun.
Van Gogh and Munch showed that the night skies were also perfect to let the glowing stars tell their secret stories. While in esoteric Symbolism the stars were related to hieroglyphs: already early ‘scientists’ like Athanasius Kircher recognized wisdom in the zodiac. Stars were signs of Egyptian Gods: while Hermes Trismegistus was seen as the creator of astronomy, Isis controlled the stars and the moon. The associated yellow/golden color was adopted by the Symbolists that in relation to blue represented a perfection that was super terrestrial.
In this paper I shall finally explain the extra layer Symbolist painters added to their stories with the use of starry skies. Khnopff related it to the world of the God of Sleep, Hypnos, as well as mirrors. While Kupka’s ‘Path of Silence’ is only illuminated by sparkling stars. What would be written in these stars?
Program: Conference Program
Website: http://www.uis.edu/hosted-orgs/ALMSD/conferences/2012/index.html