Women in Mourning: "Haunted", Belinda Lei, 2011

Introduction

Artists have been using women in mourning for centuries as a way to express their grief towards society. Many ongoing factors can lead to tears from a woman, but it is the act of mourning that really represents that something is truly wrong. The act of mourning touches the sympathy in everyone. When women cry, it can be with tears of sadness or happiness, but when women mourn, they are expressing their deepest sorrow.By using women in mourning as a means to provoke sympathy from the people, artists are able to send clearer messages of the true meaning behind their artwork.The five art pieces that I are very different in the fact that the women are grieving over something different. For example, Eve from The Expulsion from the Garden of Eden is crying over being kicked out of the Garden of Eden while the woman in Misery by Kathe Kollwitz is mourning over her dead child.

Want to know more?

Head on over to Lauren H's Silence in Art. Similar to women in mourning, artists used silence as a way to signify that there is something wrong in their society. Lauren's blog contains another art piece by Kathe Kollwitz called "Die Uberlendendem", or "Survivor". Kollqitz uses her distinctive artistic style to paint silenced children. By having silenced children, it represents how the government has taken away the basic freedoms of the people: signifying that there is something wrong in the society."Speechless" by Shirin Neshat is also found in both of our blogs. Lauren describes Neshat's picture as a silent girl "showing compliance to the government". Similarly, I described the girl as showing submission through the tears that brim to bottom of her eyes. With two different themes, Silence in Art and Women in Mourning, Lauren and I were able to reach the same conclusion: artists use are to describe the corruption of society.

STILL want to know more???

Don't worry, John G's "Loneliness in Art" is another amazing blog you can visit that relates to "Women in Mourning". While John's Blog does not involve any women, the loneliness that is represented through the pieces of art reverberates a sense of mourning. For example, John has the painting, "At Eternity's Gate" in his blog. It shows a man sitting alone in a chair with his head buried into his hands. According to John, the man reflects the loneliness and depression Van Gogh felt. Because of loneliness, the man in the picture is also mourning. The way that the man has his face buried into his hands is also similar to Adam in "Expulsion from the Garden of Eden" by Masaccio. Although Adam is experiencing regret and sadness from being expelled from the Garden of Eve and not loneliness, he still has the same mourning reaction as the man mourning over loneliness. While women are the commonly used figure to symbolize mourning, artists can also use men in mourning as a way to project their despair towards themselves, nature, or society.

Women in Mourning

Introduction

Sunday, May 15, 2011

"Haunted", Belinda Lei, 2011

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