Rembrandt van Rijn, The Blinding of Samson, 1636

Rembrandt's Blinding of Samson is one of many by the artist that create a particularly evocative experience for the viewer.  Samson, whose grimace and kick contain such strength and doom, is completely helpless to his situation. We see Delilah running out of the cave with Samson's source of strength, the hair that she cut from his head.  A beam of light shines down on Samson and his predicament is forced upon the viewer.

Many viewers have recorded experiences of simultaneously having trouble looking and having trouble looking away.  I attribute this not only to the violence of the picture, but also to the fact that as a painting is an object that is created specifically to be looked at, the viewer is engaging the very sense that he/she is observing Samson having obliterated.  The act of using your eye to watch the violent destruction of someone else's eyes is unsettling, to say the least.

Upon viewing Rembrandt's Blinding of Samson, the Bulgarian writer Elias Canetti had an unforgettable reaction...

It was Rembrandt's huge painting The Blinding of Samson that terrified me, 

tormented me, and kept me on a string.  I saw it as though it were taking 

place before my very eyes; and since it was the moment when Samson lost 

his eyesight, I bore witness in the most horrible way.  I had always been 

timid about blind people and never looked at them to long, even though they 

fascinated me.  Since they couldn't see, I felt guilty toward them.  However, 

this canvas depicted not the condition, not blindness, but the blinding 

itself...it is impossible to look away: this blinding is not yet blindness; it will 

become blindness, and it expects neither leniency nor quarter.  This blinding 

wants to be seen; and everyone who sees it knows the blinding and one sees it 

everywhere.

References:

Bal, Mieke. Reading Rembrandt: Beyond the Word-Image Opposition.  Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

Canetti, Elias. The Torch in My Ear.  Trans. Joachim Neugroschel.  New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Inc., 1982.

Art:

Städel Museum, Frankfurt

Jan Steen, In Luxury Beware, c. 1665

Jan Steen’s In Luxury Beware, is not very ambiguous in how it addresses the tensions between wealth and morality. In the 17th century Dutch world, wealth was perceived to be a “moral agitator;” it was necessary for the economic success of society as a whole, but dangerous in its ability to engineer the downfall of Dutch morality. The abundance of useless and dangerous objects in Steen’s painting address this idea of the dangers of wealth. It is precisely the excessive wealth of this household that brought about this promiscuous scene. Gone is the hardworking, closely knit Dutch family that was so important in structuring their culture. With this abundance of wealth comes unnecessary consumption; too much food, drink, luxury and sexual promiscuity. The fear of wealth being the agent of the society’s downfall is shown here through the moral downfall of this household. Seymore Slive emphasizes Steen’s painting as an art that “revels in profusion,” this profusion of material objects emphasizes the negative nature of the wealth that is shown here. Too much of anything, it seems, can't be a good thing.

While the content of the picture seems to be a well-intended moralizing lesson on the dangers in wealth and over-consumption, the fact that the painting in itself is a luxury object of value somewhat contradicts this. However, although paintings are luxurious objects, they are a craft produced by the humble artist to enhance his culture, and are therefore more virtuous than other material objects. With its abundance of everything else it is noteworthy that this house does not contain any pictures on the walls. Although the contemporary reports are few, they indicate that Dutch homes were filled with paintings. If this be the case, than this particular Dutch home’s lack of art would indicate its lack of culture, or it’s refrain from embracing Dutch culture. If this family could afford everything else present in this room, it seems they surely could afford art as well as well. The lack of art then, as a deliberate omission by the artist, might further represent a lack of culture on behalf of this morally agitated household.

References:

Jansen, Guido (ed.). Jan Steen: Painter and Storyteller. Washington D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1996.

Schama, Simon. The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age. Vintage, 1997.

Slive, Seymour. Dutch Painting: 1600-1800. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998.

Art:

Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna