Dante and Beatrice 1914

John William Waterhouse made "Dante and Beatrice", a painting that now lives at the Dahesh Museum of Art. Look at the way Waterhouse builds his scene. His marks are loose, suggestive, a painting of gestures rather than precise details. I love how the texture of the paint gives the scene a dreamlike quality, as though we are viewing a memory or a vision. The dress of the central figure is not a solid white, but rather a dance of light and shadow, woven with strokes of cream and grey. See how the artist used color to create a sense of depth and emotion. The brown figure kneeling and the group behind are more solid, but still made of these gestural marks. Waterhouse’s work reminds me a bit of the Pre-Raphaelites, who were also interested in romantic and literary subjects. It’s like they’re all in conversation, riffing off each other's ideas about beauty, love, and the power of storytelling. Art is all about finding our own way to see, and Waterhouse invites us to see the world through his eyes, full of beauty and mystery.