Detail View: The AMICA Library: Memento Mori, "To This favour"
|
AMICA ID:
|
CMA_.1965.235
|
|
AMICA Library Year:
|
2001
|
|
Object Type:
|
Paintings
|
|
Creator Name:
|
Harnett, William Michael
|
|
Creator Nationality:
|
North American; American
|
|
Creator Role:
|
artist
|
|
Creator Dates/Places:
|
1848 - 1892
|
|
Gender:
|
M
|
|
Creator Name-CRT:
|
William Harnett
|
|
Title:
|
Memento Mori, "To This favour"
|
|
Title Type:
|
Primary
|
|
View:
|
Full View
|
|
Creation Date:
|
1879
|
|
Creation Start Date:
|
1879
|
|
Creation End Date:
|
1879
|
|
Materials and Techniques:
|
oil on canvas
|
|
Dimensions:
|
Framed: 97.5cm x 77cm x 7.5cm, Unframed: 61.3cm x 81.5cm
|
|
AMICA Contributor:
|
The Cleveland Museum of Art
|
|
Owner Location:
|
Cleveland, Ohio, USA
|
|
ID Number:
|
1965.235
|
|
Credit Line:
|
Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund
|
|
Inscriptions:
|
signed lower right: WMHARNETT / 1879 [WMH in monogram].
|
|
Rights:
|
|
|
Provenance:
|
(Kennedy Galleries, New York).
|
|
Context:
|
A candle and a skull, traditional symbols of death and the passage of time, are here given specific literary associations by the artist, who has written a passage from Shakespeare's Hamlet inside the cover of the book. The quote comes from the famous graveyard scene in which Hamlet discovers the skull of the court jester, "poor Yorick." He asks the skull to summon Ophelia, his betrothed, not realizing that she is already dead: "Now get you to my lady's chamber; and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must come." Here "paint" wittily suggests Ophelia's makeup as well as the artifice of Harnett's picture.
|
|
Related Image Identifier Link:
|
CMA_.1965.235.TIF
|