Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Artistic Interpretation

Some people have word-a-day calendars. I have Google's Art of the Day. True, it's all churchy-fied, but art is art, and I can appreciate talent no matter what subject it's using to express itself. Well, if we're talking about drawing and painting talent. If talent chose to express itself by pummeling its fists against my face and body, I probably wouldn't appreciate that.

I've lost the point again. OK, today's art, "Esther With the Decree of Destruction" is a Rembrandt depiction of a scene from the book of Esther:

Mordecai: Esther - the government wants us dead. You're hot, go "persuade" the king to change his mind.

(I'm paraphrasing, there, it's obviously not a direct translation).

So the point is that Esther's supposed to be appealing enough that she can "make supplication unto the king", right? And you're telling me that's what Rembrandt found appealing? Not what I would have expected.

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