Clicking on there names below will take you to their Bios.
Atremisia Gentilesch 1593-1652:
Michelangelo Caravaggio 1571-1610:
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Judith Beheading Holofernes
Compare and contrast two paintings on the same subject, 'Judith Beheading Holofernes,' by the great Renaissance artists, Artemisia Gentileschi and Michelangelo Caravaggio. One survived a horrific rape to become a renowned artist; the other was a murderer, brigand, all around bad guy and a renowned artist.
Clicking on there names below will take you to their Bios.
Atremisia Gentilesch 1593-1652:
Michelangelo Caravaggio 1571-1610:
Clicking on there names below will take you to their Bios.
Atremisia Gentilesch 1593-1652:
Michelangelo Caravaggio 1571-1610:
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14 comments:
You seem to have a good head on your shoulders . . . too bad it's empty!
You are one person devoid of any redeeming qualities! At least to this observer!
Ah, it’s the anonymous Blackdog –come out, come out, wherever you are, criticizing my empty headedness. Suggestion, your attempt at clever repartee has fallen flat. Help is on the way. Why don’t you try familiarizing yourself with Edmond Rostand’s play, ‘Cyrano de Bergerac,’ or the movie but not the Steve Martin version or you could even try Shakespeare’s, 'Measure for Measure' but don’t read ‘the Merchant of Venice,’ you’ll never get it. If all else fails, you can fall back on those stalwarts, Moms Mabley, Richard Prior and Chris Rock. Better still, get a book on the Dozens and memorize it.
verbal capoeira . . . to become stronger, one must exercise not only the physical, but the mental, emotional and spiritual! Every game has a purpose in the larger event we have all entered into!
Are you antisemetic Mr. Shylock or just anti everything and everyone? With the exception of yourself, of course! I would be willing to bet that there is not a pane of glass nor mirror which has ever disappointed you upon glancing at it!
If ignorant both of your enemy and yourself, you are certain to be in peril.
Sun Tzu
By the way you and I engaged in polite conversation face to face on several occaisions . . . how can you call me anonymous?
Oh, that's right , Shylock couldn't have been an anti semite because he was a Jew, . . . but he was racist!!!!
Blackdog, glad to see you got your Semites and anti-Semites straighten out –well sort of. I first read ‘The Merchant of Venice’ in high school and thought as most did that Shylock was villain. As I’ve gotten older and have gotten a better understanding of the complexities of the world, Shylock has taken on more and more the visage of a ‘Hero’. Shylock, like Job, stands by his beliefs irrespective of the consequences. He is the proverbial mouse giving the finger to the cat as he is about to be eaten.
He can’t be a racist, as the concept of race didn’t develop until the 19th century. Check out Carl Linnaeus, 1707-1778.
Quit playing the semantics game Nat, it is unbecoming.
My introduction to Shakespeare was at 8 years of age. I was probably 12 when I first read Merchant.
Kazikli Voyvoda was still a serial killer in the 14th century, even though the term originated in the 20th century!
What's in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet. . .
Blackdog, please cite the evidence showing Shylock as a racist.
Act 3 Scene 1:
SHYLOCK
To bait fish withal: if it will feed nothing else,
it will feed my revenge. He hath disgraced me, and
hindered me half a million; laughed at my losses,
mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my
bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine
enemies; and what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath
not a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs,
dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with
the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject
to the same diseases, healed by the same means,
warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as
a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed?
if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison
us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not
revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will
resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian,
what is his humility? Revenge. If a Christian
wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by
Christian example? Why, revenge. The villany you
teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I
will better the instruction.
He is angry with the Catholic Christians because they are in power and treat the Jews as inferiors when in fact he believes in his heart that they are truly the better people because of their code of ethics and behaviors towards others even not of their race or faith.
Blockdog: the information about 'black' racism, St. Jerome and the rise of monasticism can be found in Diarmaid MaCulloch's book, 'Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years.' I highly recommend it.
The gentiles who were mostly Italian Catholics and controlled by an intolerant and corrupt Papacy, persecuted non Christians such as Jews and Muslims unmercifully even in Venice. Shylock got away with much more under the system than the average Jew of the time because of his wealth and influence, but in the end that didn't really help him.
There may have been Catholic Christians of many races and colors, but the power structure was White Italian.
And it is not so much what Shylock says, but his feelings which show through because of Shakespeare's eloquent pen.
The three main groups in Europe at the time. . . European, Muslim and Jew thought of each other as inferiors, but the Italians had the power there.
I think that deep inside, this really infuriated Shylock because he wasn't any different from the Europeans and if he had the power in his hand , they would suffer as he was made to suffer.
I really feel that deep down he hated them!
You are right though Nat, it is not stated in the prose, this is my interpretation of the character. Maybe I am reading to much into him!
Hope the libray has that book. Thanks for the heads up.
Blackdog, this could go on and on. Shylock is a fictional character. People did not have a concept of race as we have. Your generalizations about the three main groups is incorrect and the people who counted did not necessarily think of the other as inferior. The term European is a Muslim creation from Islamic Spain.
Go read my comment on Old Doc's blog about Golf, you will find it interesting.
Who does not know history's first law to be that an author must not dare to tell anything but the truth? And its second that he must make bold to tell the whole truth? That there must be no suggestion of partiality anywhere in his writings? Nor of malice?
History is like Rashomon.
Everyone sees the truth differently.
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