Poetry Through Art

The poem, Lady of Shallot, was made into a painting by Waterhouse. The painting in my opinion doesn't give a good interpretation of the poem. The painting itself just depicts this woman getting up from her chair and looking at the viewer as you see here. The story is about a woman who wants to escape the small island Shallot to see her true love Lancelot in Camelot. The woman looks mainly like she's trying to escape prison. In a way it has to do with the poem because she has heard rumors that if she stays in Shallot weaving then she would die. What I would do to change the painting is have her look out the window and out into the distant land of Camelot. There in the distance would be the knight Lancelot who she is looking to with starstruck eyes. Her weaving basket would be beside her and you would see the whole Camelot seen through the mirror that it talks about in the poem.

The next poem, the Fall of Icarus, was made into a painting by Bruegal. This painting was okay if you look at it closely. At first it looks like a normal scene in the Greek island, Crete. Only if you spend some time looking at it, like I did, do you actually notice Icarus drowning in a small corner. The painting itself is beautiful but in my opinion it should have more of a focus on Icarus. If I could actually paint something else besides stick people, Icarus would be a major focus, since the painting is about him. I would put him falling into the water with his wings wax wrapped all around him, pulling him down towards the dark ocean. Or I would also paint him flying up to the sky really close to the sun, with his wings slowly melting. The ocean would be below him and he would be looking down to what would seem his obvious death.