If there is indeed empyrean light and it looks like the painting above, I'll get a migraine halfway there.
Clausen, George (Sir) - Youth Mourning The painting is a response to the horrors of the First World War and, in particular, the death of Clausen’s own daughter’s fiancé. He uses the nakedness of the figure and the starkness of the barren landscape to emphasize the grief and emptiness of death. A wooden cross marks a grave and in the distance are the flooded craters of a battlefield.
If it's all the same to you, I reckon I'll pick something a little more positive than either proffered poison.
Etruscan funeral rites were not somber but festive. Two dancers on the wall of the Tomb of the Triclinium, c. 470 BCE, Etruscan chamber tomb, Tarquinia, Italy.
“The Devil Ice Skating when Hell Freezes Over” by John Collier (1908) Does the Devil here remind you of anyone?
Three of the most famous advocates for Black American rights being whitewashed. Jonathan Harris, "Critical Race Theory" (2021) https://news.artnet.com/art-world/critical-race-theory-whitewashing-painting-2062394
That seems to be closley related to the Maenads of Greek myth: Often the maenads were portrayed as inspired by Dionysus into a state of ecstatic frenzy through a combination of dancing and intoxication. [...] These warlike parthenoi ("virgins") from the hills, associated with a Dionysios pseudanor ("fake male Dionysus"), routed an invading enemy. In southern Greece they were described as Bacchae, Bassarides, Thyiades, Potniades,[better source needed] and other epithets. The term maenad has come to be associated with a wide variety of women, supernatural, mythological, and historical,associated with the god Dionysus and his worship. Dancing maenad. Detail from an ancient Greek Paestumred figure skyphos, made by Python, c. 330–320 BC. British Museum, London In Euripides' play The Bacchae, maenads of Thebes murder King Pentheus after he bans the worship of Dionysus. Dionysus, Pentheus' cousin, himself lures Pentheus to the woods, where the maenads tear him apart. His corpse is mutilated by his own mother, Agave, who tears off his head, believing it to be that of a lion. A group of maenads also kill Orpheus, when he refuses to entertain them while mourning his dead wife. In ceramic art, the frolicking of Maenads and Dionysus is often a theme depicted on kraters, used to mix water and wine. These scenes show the maenads in their frenzy running in the forests, often tearing to pieces any animal they happen to come across. According to the versions of the myth I'm familiar with, actual human women would supposedly become possessed by maenads in festivals of Dionysus and dance themselves into a frienzied state, and some poor bastard in the crowd would be selected as their victim. They would stomp on him as they dance, supposedly killing him. This part was probably totally mythical though. It seems something universal is being expressed in both of these myths. And I'll bet there are many similar myths in other cultures as well. Source Sounds like they represented the state of frenzied intoxication, through wine or emotion and nocturnal celebration, dance etc, that can overtake people and destroy them as rational human beings. Either that or it's saying something about certain kinds of women (people maybe) you see at weddings and parties where the police tend to get called. I've seen many women like this in police bodycam videos, they tend to be the ones who start the violence, and then the men have to get involved. And the women frequently attack police bodily and scream obscenities in their faces.
I see the parallels. Woman as the bewitchers, a common trope in ancient literature. And when it comes to violence, there is somewhat of a double standard. Violent women are possessed, demonic, intoxicated. Violent men are brave warriors. Consider this portrayal of the boy-warrior Cuchulainn in battle (circa 2000 years ago), emphasizing what a formidable opponent he was. In How the Irish Saved Civilization, I was captivated with the chapter that introduced me to the independent-spirited Queen Medb and Cuchulainn, and the ancient epic Irish tale, TÁIN BÓ CÚALNGE - the Cattle Raid of Cooley. You can read a translation of TÁIN BÓ CÚALNGE for free online at Project Gutenberg: The Project Gutenberg eBook of TÁIN BÓ CÚALNGE, by Joseph Dunn.
Well, that depends on the situation. Even in war there's a definite line between courage and war crimes. I've never seen a school shooter for instance called a valiant warrior, or a domestic abuser, or a street gangster doing a drive-by shooting. Some violence is necessary and warranted, and some isn't. You want to be careful to avoid broad stereotypes. And of course any woman who proves her bravery in combat is also considered a brave warrior. I don't understand exactly what myths like the Maenads mean. I can see two possibilities that seem likely to me (and there may be more): 1) With many myths it feels like they're referring to either the masculine or the feminine in all of us. Meaning the Maenads for instance could represent what the Greeks considered a feminine aspect of the soul we all possess that's susceptible to drunkenness and frenzy and something akin to violent madness. In this sense, heroic myths aren't just for men, and myths featuring female characters aren't just for women, but all myths are for everyone. At times we all need to find the inner Odysseus (trickster hero), or the inner Penelope (his wife, patiently waiting for him to return from war and fending off the advances of her many suitors). 2) Or possibly they really are intended for the myths with male characters to be for men, and female characters for women. And I can even see that it could be a mix of both. Generally myths are so broadly written, and so true in a deep profound sense, that they apply across many dimensions of meaning, not just to one narrow one. Such as the fact that many gods characterized both forces of nature and certain human tendencies or traits that matched them. Like Loki being both a betraying trickster who masquerades as a friend, and also representing fire, which cooks our food, brings comfort and warmth in cold winters, but can also rage out of control rapidly and become a killer/destroyer. There's a great deal of depth and psychological wisdom in myths, which is often ignored or sneered at by today's intelligentsia. Myth emerges from the unconscious, so the people who 'wrote' them weren't consciously aware of everything—the full meaning would only emerge gradually and perhaps never to a single person. They're the kind of things that as you learn more about life they take on more depth and meaning. This is how really profound art works, it doesn't have a single shallow, consciously arrived-at meaning. If it does, it's more like propaganda or dogma.
Did someone mess with this image to add the light effect? Seems one of those "special edition" treatments that makes it worse.
Yes, it seems the one I posted is a colour modification of the public domain image https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Empyrean_Light.jpg
