Why does Ophelia part with her life so easily, why does she not grab onto the gnarled willow – the druidic Hamlet, choosing between death and the “little death”? Words to art historian Marina Khaikina and psychoanalyst Andrei Rossokhin.
“Ophelia” (Tate Gallery, London, UK) was written by Millais between 1851 and 1852 based on the plot of Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”. The artist literally illustrates the words that Gertrude says: the crazy Ophelia was about to hang flower garlands on the branches of a willow and fell into a stream of water.
“Time just stood still here”
Marina Khaikina, art critic: “The picture is fascinating: the brightness of plants in all their variety of shades contrasts with the transparent waters of the river and the heavy fabric of Ophelia’s iridescent dress. While working on the painting, Milles spent 11 hours making sketches from nature; the result was one of the most thorough and detailed descriptions of English nature worthy of an enthusiastic botanist. The artist was interested in the language of flowers, which was experiencing a new birth in Victorian England. With their help, Milles tells the story of his heroine. So, willow, nettle and chamomile were associated with forgotten love, pain and innocence. Pansies symbolized unrequited love, violets adorning Ophelia’s neck were considered a symbol of fidelity, chastity, and untimely death. Poppy meant death itself, immortalized by forget-me-nots. The tragic story of Ophelia was very popular with Victorian artists, and her suicide was perceived in Puritan England almost as a rebellion, as a challenge to prejudice.
But it seems to me that Milles was even more attracted by the opportunity to present this story beautifully: he used a new painting technique, which allowed him to achieve the brightness of colors. I think he was occupied with the idea of painting a dress under water – it’s extremely difficult. After all, water flows, distorting colors and shapes, giving them shine … Milles painted the picture for a long time, first – a landscape, then, separately – Ophelia. The artist Elizabeth Siddal posed for him for four long winter months: she lay down in a bath of water, which the artist heated with candles and oil lamps. One day the lamps went out, but Milles was so engrossed in his work that he did not notice it. Elizabeth fell ill, and the artist had to pay for the services of a doctor in order to continue his work.
Trying to capture the beautiful, the artist did not notice the time. He is not in the picture either: time has stopped, disappeared and, it seems, will never flow again. The waters of the river froze, the wind stopped, the branches of the willow do not sway, and the petals do not fall from the flowers. There is no life there, but there is no death either – this beauty is eternal.”
Read more:
- What does this picture tell me? “Spring” by Sandro Botticelli
“Her obedience is deceptive”
Andrey Rossokhin, psychoanalyst: “I see here a riot of nature, flowering, which is associated with spring and something life-affirming. But at the same time, my eye is drawn to the stream. The water in it is so dark that it creates a feeling of incredible depth, abyss. This detail seems unnatural, because it is obvious: a small stream cannot be so deep, Ophelia should not drown in it. But I see how the water gradually draws it in, and that is why there is fear and an alarming foreboding of death. The moment between life and death – this may be the first and rather superficial reading of the picture. Ophelia, as we know, went mad after Hamlet killed her father. In psychoanalytic reality, every man, conquering a woman, must symbolically kill her father. That is, to force out, to replace the father in her heart. If we consider the events of the play as a theater of internal, mental experiences, then Hamlet’s act is the first step towards winning her heart. And Ophelia, who had previously been in girlish sexual fantasies and dreams, could now give herself to the man who conquered her, could become a woman. In her body, in her open hands, and especially in her face, in her half-open mouth, I see humility and openness. But what? New female experience or death? I feel the eroticism of the picture, which, in general, is natural: the artist at that time was only 22 years old, and it is impossible to believe that the sight of a beautiful model in the bathroom did not awaken his sexual fantasies. But the most interesting is not this. The artist did not just capture the transitional moment between the girlish and feminine state. I see in this mise-en-scene a situation of choice: what will Ophelia choose? Surrender to female attraction, move from love dreams to real relationships or abandon them?
Read more:
- «Hamlet | Collage” at the Theater of Nations
By the way, Hamlet is also present in this picture … in the form of a tree. It would seem that willow is a female symbol, but here it is a clumsy, rough tree, it looks like a druid and looks very brutal. The tree looms over Ophelia, leaning so low that she could grab onto it, hold on and survive. She has a point of support. Why doesn’t Ophelia do this? Why does she not grab a relationship with a man? Why between death and “little death” (as orgasm is called in French) does she choose the former? One reason I see is that the druidic Hamlet is passive: he will support her if Ophelia herself reaches out her hands, but does not offer help first. And the second reason is the deadly narcissism of Ophelia. We see the contrast of the beautiful harmonious world that surrounds Ophelia, her own ideal beauty and the terrible, gnarled tree that frightens and repels with its rough realism. She renounces real, sensual, emotional life with its non-ideality in favor of narcissistic death – that which will allow her to keep her image beautiful, pure and immaculate. Dying, she seeks to return to paradise, to the mother universe (immersion in water in our unconscious means merging with her mother), where her beauty and integrity will be conserved. And rounded corners contribute to the unconscious perception of the picture as a mother’s womb. Ophelia seems to be immersed in her mother’s womb, preferring the narcissistically ideal eternity to the imperfectly alive.
John Everett Millais (1829-1896), British painter, one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood – a society of artists who sought to return to the sincerity and simplicity of the art of the pre-Raphael era. Exhibited in 1852 at the Royal Academy, “Ophelia” approved the position of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Until now, Milles is one of the most beloved British artists of the mid-XNUMXth century.