Androcles c. 1902

Jean-Léon Gérôme painted 'Androcles' with oil on canvas using a warm, dark palette to depict a scene with a lion in a cave. Looking at this painting, I imagine Gérôme in his studio, maybe trying to work out his own relationship to the past, to history painting, and to some other kinds of truths. The lion’s roar is the focal point of the painting, a dramatic gesture rendered with thick, textural brushstrokes. The artist used a limited palette but he added touches of blue and red to help give depth. It's like the artist is asking questions about storytelling, about what is real and what is imagined, about the kind of theater that painters can make on a flat surface. In his wider practice, Gérôme returns to historical and mythological subjects, exploring themes of human drama and moral dilemmas. He’s talking to us, and to painters before and after him.