#art academy
A Hamadryade (1893), by J.W. Waterhouse
The painting shows a Hamadryade (a nymph living in a tree) spying on Pan while he plays a pan flute. Nature was idealized in the Romantic tradition and particularly the Symbolist movement used “pre-historic” images of a world full of mythical creatures. Arnold Böcklin is another typical example of such a Symbolist painter from Germany. Waterhouse however dared to go one step further by painting Pan as a young boy and the nymph fully naked. Only some leaves barely hide her vagina - the sexual connotation is obvious. The work bares resemblance to “A Naiad”, also painted in 1893 and described earlier in this blog.
In some of his early works, Waterhouse used peculiar compositions or formats and with this painting he used the same trick because it measures a height of 160 cm, while it is only 61 cm wide. The work was displayed in the Royal Art Academy in the same year of its painting.
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