Well, hey there, y’all! Today, I’m gonna yap a bit about this fella named Arnold Bocklin and his picture, “Prometheus.” Don’t rightly know much about fancy art, but I reckon I can tell ya what I see, ya know? This Bocklin fella, he painted a whole bunch of stuff, like mountains and lakes and such. He even did a picture of some fella named Alexander Mikhelis, whoever that is. Sounds like a city slicker name to me.
Anyways, this Prometheus picture… it ain’t no pretty flowers or nothin’. It’s kinda dark and spooky, if ya ask me. There’s this fella, Prometheus I guess, chained up to a rock. Looks mighty uncomfortable, let me tell ya. He’s all naked and whatnot, and there’s this big ol’ bird, an eagle I think, pecking at his liver. Yuck! Makes my stomach churn just thinkin’ about it.
- Prometheus was chained
- An eagle was pecking at him
- It looks dark and scary
Now, I ain’t no scholar, but I heard tell that Prometheus did somethin’ to tick off the big man upstairs, Zeus or Jupiter or somethin’. He stole fire, they say, and gave it to the people. Now, fire’s mighty useful, I ain’t denyin’ that. Keeps ya warm in the winter, cooks yer food, all that good stuff. But stealin’ it? That ain’t right. Specially not from a god, I reckon.
So, Zeus, he got real mad, and he chained Prometheus up as punishment. And that eagle, well, that’s part of the punishment too. Every day, that poor bird gotta eat Prometheus’s liver, and then every night it grows back, just so the eagle can eat it again the next day. Talk about a rough deal! Makes my back ache just thinkin’ about bein’ chained up like that. I tell ya, I wouldn’t last a minute.
Bocklin, he sure did a good job of makin’ Prometheus look miserable. You can see the pain in his face, the way his body is all twisted up. And that eagle, it looks mean and nasty. It’s got its claws dug into Prometheus’s side, and its beak is all bloody. It ain’t a pretty sight, that’s for sure.
But ya know, there’s somethin’ else in the picture too, besides all the misery. There’s a kinda strength in Prometheus, even though he’s chained up. He ain’t givin’ up, ya know? He’s still defiant, even in pain. And that, I reckon, is what Bocklin was tryin’ to show us.
Arnold Bocklin, he learned his paintin’ skills in some fancy place called Dusseldorf academy. And he was buddies with another painter fella, Anselm Feuerbach. Sounds like a bunch of highfalutin folks to me. They was part of somethin’ called the Dusseldorf school of paintin’. Bocklin’s teacher, a fella named Schirmer, thought he was real smart, so he sent him off to Antwerp and Brussels. Guess he wanted Bocklin to learn even more fancy stuff.
Anyways, back to Prometheus. I heard tell that some folks see Prometheus as a hero, ya know? Someone who stood up for the little guy, even if it meant gettin’ in trouble with the big shots. And maybe that’s true. But I also reckon that there’s a lesson in there about obeyin’ the rules and not stealin’ stuff. Even if it’s somethin’ as useful as fire.
So, that’s my take on this “Prometheus” picture. It ain’t pretty, but it makes ya think. And that’s what good art is supposed to do, I guess. It’s supposed to make ya feel somethin’, even if it’s just a little bit uncomfortable. And it’s supposed to make ya think about the world and yer place in it. Even if yer just an old woman like me, who don’t know nothin’ about fancy art.
And I hear tell Bocklin even painted a picture of a place called Monte Morello, above Florence. Now, I ain’t never been to no Florence, but it sounds like one of them fancy places overseas. Probably got a whole bunch of them pigeons and such. Anyways, that’s all I got to say about this here Arnold Bocklin and his Prometheus painting.
Tags: [Arnold Bocklin, Prometheus, Painting, Art, Mythology, Zeus, Eagle, Punishment, Hero, Fire]
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