A few words about the upcoming movie…
Expectations play a huge part in how you’ll experience an artwork for the first time. I’ve heard lovers of The Odyssey say that they’re worried that Christopher Nolan won’t be faithful to Homer’s text. They’re hoping for and expecting Homer’s story. My expectations for this movie are quite different. I’m going in expecting to see a Christopher Nolan story, not a Homer story. The text of The Odyssey is secondary. In fact, I’d prefer to see Christopher Nolan’s vision rather than his attempt at illustrating Homer.
One thing that spending time with Renaissance art this past year has taught me is to see the individual artist’s spirit rather than focus on the source material they use. Raphael, Michelangelo, Botticelli, Donatello, etc., all drew from the same biblical stories, but they used those stories to create their own unique characters, conflicts, and themes. Michelangelo’s take on David is different than Donatello’s. Neither is merely illustrating the bible story, rather they are embodying each artist’s own stylistic and thematic interests.
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In the same way, The Odyssey has been adapted over and over again in art and literature and cinema over the years. And each version capture’s the artist’s spirit who adapted it more than Homer’s. As one small contemporary example, compare Andrei Konchalovsky’s 1997 miniseries with Uberto Pasolini’s film of 2024, and you’ll see a contrast as great as a Michelangelo vs. a Donatello. I’m expecting Christopher Nolan’s version of The Odyssey to be very different from those other two, and I’m excited about that. I like Christopher Nolan movies (Inception and Oppenheimer are up there for me), and I want to see how his version of The Odyssey uses the stylistic and thematic interests that proliferate the body of his work.
In that vein, here are five paintings inspired by characters and scenes from The Odyssey, but created by 19th century artists who have their own stories to tell. I like these paintings as artworks on their own merit, not as mere illustrations of Homer’s text. I have not included the artwork titles so you can immerse yourself in each artist’s story before being influenced by your recollections of Homer’s. Let me know in the comments which one(s) you’re intrigued by!
Five Paintings…
By Henri Lehmann, 1869, Minneapolis Institute of Arts.
By George Hitchcock, 1906, Indianapolis Museum of Art. (This one is featured in the TTA App here!)
By John W. Waterhouse, 1912, Aberdeen Art Gallery.
By Pierre-Narcisse Guerin, 1817, Louvre.
By Arnold Böcklin, 1882, Kunstmuseum Basel.
