Egeus fordert vor dem Herrscherpaar Theseus und Hippolyta, seine Tochter Hermia solle Demetrius anstelle von Lysander heiraten c. 1883

Editor: This drawing, made with gouache around 1883 by Leopold von Bode, depicts a scene titled 'Egeus fordert vor dem Herrscherpaar Theseus und Hippolyta, seine Tochter Hermia solle Demetrius anstelle von Lysander heiraten'. The staging is rather interesting...what do you make of it? Curator: I am struck by how von Bode manipulates the planar depth, flattening the perspectival recession usually found in history painting. Note the use of the proscenium arch, how the red drapery isolates the figures within its frame; the formal theatricality here calls our attention to the relationships *between* the figures, mediated and formalized within this pictorial space. Editor: Can you elaborate on that idea? Curator: Certainly. Consider how the composition, dominated by verticals and horizontals, arrests movement. Egeus' gesture toward Theseus creates a vector, certainly, but that direction is ultimately blocked by the figures of Lysander and Hermia, whose gazes avert both left and right. Thus, despite the scene's implied drama, the structural components neutralize potential for narrative momentum. Do you see that at play here? Editor: Yes, I hadn't noticed it until now! So even though the scene depicts conflict, the structure doesn't let us get carried away by emotion. Curator: Precisely. It is this interplay between emotional expression and the structuring architecture of the image that gives the piece its peculiar strength. We are invited not to empathize, but to observe. Editor: I see the work in a totally new way now! It's all so deliberately constructed. Thanks for sharing your perspective.