A Relaxing Death

The painting titled Ophelia was painted by Sir John Everett Millais in 1852. It portrays the character Ophelia, from William Shakespeare’s play Hamlet, singing before she drowns. The first time I saw this painting I was immediately struck by how calm it made me feel but after I learned the story behind it, I found the painting to be very haunting. I was shocked at how this painting was able to make me feel both bliss and horror almost simultaneously. Ever since viewing this painting, every time I listen to the song “An Arc Of Doves” by Harold Budd and Brian Eno, I feel both calm but also scared because this song makes me feel like I am underwater.

This idea of being underwater was something I tried to capture in the images I created for this week’s assignment. I did this by mostly using the color blue in my paintings but also by trying to keep a steady flow of the brush to represent flowing weightlessly in the water. For two of my paintings all I did was listen to the song with the lights out and my eyes closed and just began painting what I saw. This idea stemmed from Annie Dillard’s essay Seeing, which talks a lot about not being able to see what is around you and how it makes you feel. I also used the idea from the novel of stopping and thinking more about what I was looking at when taking pictures that made me feel like I was underwater. With this essay and project in mind I began looking at objects I saw everyday and thought what it would be like to see them while underwater. I simulated this by covering my camera lens with tape and coloring the tape blue.

I attempted to make my images feel very calming and relaxing but also somewhat off putting to convey the ideas of Ophelia, of a relaxing decline into death.

An Arc Of Doves-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Okqn2Z-MT-A