Christian Dirce – Henryk Siemiradzki | #visual arts

Christian Dirce by Henryk Siemiradzki is a large format composition, showing a scene in a Roman amphitheatre, where Emperor Nero, his court, and spectators, are looking at the corpse of a girl, tortured in a spectacle which has just finished.

The body of the titular Dirce, tied to a bull, is located in the central section of the composition and ever so slightly shifted to the right hand side. To the left, we see Nero accompanied by a centurion, while behind them – members of the imperial court. The far right side of the canvas is filled by the figures of black slaves carrying the emperor’s litter and by captives – Christians, who probably took part in the bloody show.

Henryk Siemiradzki’s painting is classified as one of the big academic ‘machines.’ Its grandiosity refers to both the subject and to the format of the canvas, which corresponds with the importance of the content. In the academic hierarchy of genres, storias, i.e. paintings ‘narrating’ a broadly understood history, including the history of humanity and nations, biblical and mythological events, as well as literary stories, were the most valued.

Details of the painting Christian Dirce by Henryk Siemiradzki – Image Gallery

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Christian Dirce meets and exceeds this requirement, as in its representation of the martyrdom of the first Christians sacrificing their life for their faith, it not only refers to the history of ancient Rome in the 1^st century AD, but also, through its title, alludes to the Greek mythology: Dirce, second wife of Lycus, the king of Thebes, was tied to the bull’s horns by the sons of Antiope, the king’s first wife, in an act of revenge for the mistreatment of their mother.

Siemiradzki’s work gained additional meanings in the eyes of the Polish audience, which found in it elements relating to the national history and the current political situation in the country. Especially in the context of Henryk Sienkiewicz’s book Quo Vadis, which was published one year prior, the painting was interpreted as an allegory of the martyrdom of the Polish nation. Not to decide about the artist’s intentions, one could safely assume that he did not make any reference to the national history, but the reception of his piece demonstrates how the Polish society projected its own ideas and myths onto it. The art piece perfectly subscribes to the cosmopolitan current of Academicism, as, with its ancient subject, it targets the universal cognitive horizon of the broadest possible group of recipients.

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Siemiradzki composed the scene of torture in a theatrical manner, which to some extent allowed the viewer to identify with the work. The large scale of the painting probably also contributed to that, as the observer sees figures which are almost life-size. However, it was the composition – based on diagonals, leading the viewer’s sight inside the painting’s space – which played a significant role in the process of reception. These solutions cause an ‘absorption’ of the viewers and create an impression that they are witnesses of the presented scenes – one of the onlookers gathered in the arena, around the girl’s body.

The cruel subject of the painting was supposed to move the viewer, inspire empathy, and invite them to reflect on moral issues. This reception is disturbed by the expression of the figures, or rather the lack thereof, which could be considered – applying the academic criteria of measure and judgment – as the painter’s mistake. We see ambivalent faces, lacking any tension, looking indifferently at the deceased Dirce. As much as this manoeuvre could be justified in the case of Nero and his court, whose representatives are portrayed as rotten and emotionless, it is hard to explain its application in the case of the other characters: spectators, and especially the slaves. This complaint was expressed already by the painter’s contemporaries, including Stanisław Witkiewicz, in reference to an earlier painting by Siemiradzki, Nero's Torches.

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The intended emotions and moral agitation are replaced by other impulses. What strikes is the aestheticisation of the whole composition, in which the painter mainly concentrated on reflecting the wealth and splendour of the court. The painting is to captivate through the colours of fabrics and the radiance of marbles and jewels. One could regard them in terms of the academic costume principle, which demanded an almost archeological knowledge of the details, which would allow to recreate a scene in compliance with the historical truths. However, the effort which Siemiradzki put into reflecting the details of the shiny gold on the litters, the contrasting outfits, or complexion of the black slaves, etc., made these details compete with the subject of the artwork, taking over the viewer’s attention. This reception, boiled down to an aesthetic contemplation, is furthered by the lack of any kind of tension and or action, which not only misses a so-called fruitful moment, but any trace of any activity.

The story is ‘told’ through appealing props, but this narrative refers to something completely different than what the title of the artwork suggests. It is not only the wealth of details, but most of all the visual eroticism which defeats the seemingly noble theme. In the foreground, the statuesque, white and smooth body is juxtaposed with the dark, almost black, and hefty mass of the bull. There is hardly any signs of violence which would mar this nude. There are no wounds on the girl, no traces of dirt or blood on her body. Even though the theme of the painting is death by martyrdom, it is difficult to bear that in mind while looking at the overaestheticised representation of the nude. The lofty theme is a cover for an unsophisticated eroticism.

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The essentially trivial message of the art piece, based on the contrast of violence and eroticism, is surprisingly mirrored in the hidden visual source of the composition – a small photograph taken in a Roman abattoir. Siemiradzki commissioned it, as he needed a model for painting the body of a dead bull. The arrival of the photographer was met with curiosity from the employees, who gathered around the animal and therefore got to be documented in the picture. In the painter’s studio, the documentary photograph turned into the base of the first sketch, a visual prototype of the painting. The photograph substituted a drawing, which according to the academic theory was supposed to be the initial footprint of a thought appearing in the artist’s mind through a divine inspiration. The painter of course sublimated the reality registered on photographic film. His paintbrush obliterated the dirty aprons and common faces, thus changing butchers into courtiers.

In spite of all of its splendour, the importance of the theme, and the canvas’s size, Siemiradzki’s painting, in the most literal sense, exposes the crisis of academic values at the end of the 19^th century. The grand storia turned into a display of eye-catching forms and a show of the painter’s technical virtuosity. Their exoticism and magnificence were merged with eroticism and violence, thus degrading the message to the level of the unsophisticated interpretative powers of the viewer.

It was not only the big subjects and moral missions that gave in to the taste of the already expanding mass audiences of salons and the constantly increasing – predominantly thanks to reproductions – group of art followers. The character of the painting was also determined by the changes in the painter’s technique, as he started using new pictorial media and was increasingly aware of the new criteria of artistic evaluation, while still being attached to the outdated rules of Academicism.

Bibliography:

Maria Poprzęcka, Akademizm (Warsaw, 1977)
Maria Poprzęcka, Pochwała malarstwa (Gdańsk, 2001)
Akademizm w XIX wieku, exhibition catalogue, National Museum in Warsaw, 1998

Henryk Siemiradzki
Christian Dirce (original title: Dirce chrześcijańska)
1897
oil on canvas, 263 x 530 cm
collection of the National Museum in Warsaw

Author: Magdalena Wróblewska, December 2010, transl. AM, August 2016

henryk siemiradzki

academic art

henryk sienkiewicz

national museum in warsaw

polish painting

quo vadis

christian dirce

painters of the 19th century

eroticism

academicism