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Homage
to the island of the dead |
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Homage
to the island of the dead |
| 150 x 225 cm. 1990, Oil on Canvas |
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This metaphysical anthem
to beauty and death, which is the absolute masterpiece of Arnold
Bôcklin, has instigated for more than a century an enormous
volume of pictorial comments. I have waited a long time
before tackling the problems of the "homage". My natural melancholy, my nostalgia for an artistic golden age and my morbid taste for the inescapable that tarnishes beauty had already prepared my hand and my spirit. But my natural vitality was refusing this ultimate voyage into the absolute. So the boat which went towards the funeral and final place returned towards us in a movement of panic because it was not yet the hour to seek the place of rest. The island then took the brilliance of a priceless stone to seduce, but we remained on the bank to watch the bleeding heart from afar. |