SEA OF BIANCO / MARE DI BIANCO

oil on canvas 120x100 cm

€ 1800.00

Man and the Sea

by Charles Baudelaire

Always, unfettered man, you will cherish the sea!

The sea your mirror, you look into your mind

In its eternal billows surging without end,

And as its gulfs are bitter, so must your spirit be.

You plunge with joy into this image of your own:

You hug it with your eyes and arms; your heart

Forgets for a time its noisy beat, becomes a part

Of a greater, more savage and less tameable moan.

In your own ways, you both are brooding and discreet:

Man, no one has mapped your chasm's hidden floor,

Oh sea, no one knows your inmost riches, for

Your jealousy hides secrets none can repeat.

As the uncounted swarm of centuries gathers

You two have fought without pity or remorse, both

From sheer love of the slaughter and of death

Oh, eternal wrestlers, oh, relentless brothers!

AURORA

oil on canvas 120 x 80 cm.

€ 1.500,00

Eos, in Latin Aurora, the goddess of the morning red, who brings up the light of day from the east. She was a daughter of Hyperion and Theia or Euryphassa, and a sister of Helios and Selene. (Hes. Theog. 371, &c.; Hom. Hymn in Sol. ii.) Ovid (Met. ix. 420, Fast. iv. 373) calls her a daughter of Pallas. At the close of night she rose front the couch of her beloved Tithonus, and on a chariot drawn by the swift horses Lampus and Phaëton she ascended up to heaven from the river Oceanus, to announce the coming light of the sun to the gods as well as to mortals. (Hom. Od. v. 1, &c., xxiii. 244; Virg. Aen. iv. 129, Georg. i. 446; Hom. Hymn in Merc. 185; Theocrit. ii. 148, xiii. 11.) In the Homeric poems Eos not only announces the coming Helios, but accompanies him throughout the day, and her career is not complete till the evening; hence she is sometimes mentioned where one would have expected Helios (Od. v. 390, x. 144); and the tragic writers completely identify her with Hemera, of whom in later times the same myths are related as of Eos. (Paus. i. 3. § 1, iii. 18. § 7.) The later Greek and the Roman poets followed, on the whole, the notions of Eos, which Homer had established, and the splendour of a southern aurora, which lasts much longer than in our climate, is a favourite topic with the ancient poets. Mythology represents her as having carried off several youths distinguished for their beauty. Thus she carried away Orion, but the gods were angry at her for it, until Artemis with a gentle arrow killed him. (Hom. Od. v. 121.) According to Apollodorus (i. 4. § 4) Eos carried Orion to Delos, and was ever stimulated by Aphrodite. Cleitus, the son of Mantius, was carried by Eos to the seats of the immortal gods (Od. xv. 250), and Tithonus, by whom she became the mother of Emathion and Memnon, was obtained in like manner. She begged of Zeus to make him immortal, but forgot to request him to add eternal youth. So long as he was young and beautiful, she lived with him at the end of the earth, on the banks of Oceanus ; and when he grew old, she nursed him, until at length his voice disappeared and his body became quite dry. She then locked the body up in her chamber, or metamorphosed it into a cricket. (Hom. Hymn. in Ven. 218, &c.; Horat. Carm. i. 22. 8, ii. 16. 30; Apollod. iii. 12. § 4; Hes. Theog. 984; Serv. ad Virg. Georg. i. 447, iii. 328, Aen. iv. 585.) When her son Memnon was going to fight against Achilles, she asked Hephaestus to give her arms for him, and when Memnon was killed, her tears fell down in the form of morning dew. (Virg. Aen. viii. 384.) By Astraeus Eos became the mother of Zephyrus, Boreas, Notus, Heosphorus, and the other stars. (Hesiod. Theog. 378.) Cephalus was carried away by her from the summit of mount Hymetttus to Syria, and by him she became the mother of Phaëton or Tithonus, the father of Phaëton; but afterwards she restored her beloved to his wife Procris. (Hes. Theog. 984; Apollod. iii. 14. § 3; Paus. i. 3. § 1; Ov. Met. vii. 703, &c.; Hygin. Fab 189; comp. CEPHALUS.) Eos was represented in the pediment of the kingly stoa at Athens in the act of carrying off Cephalus, and in the same manner she was seen on the throne of the Amyclaean Apollo. (Paus. i. 3. § 1, iii. 18. § 7.) At Olympia she was represented in the act of praying to Zeus for Memnon. (v. 22. 2.) In the works of art still extant, she appears as a winged goddess or in a chariot drawn by four horses.

source: http://www.mythindex.com

NEREID / NEREIDE

oil on canvas (60 x 80 cm.)

€ 800,00

Nereis, or Nerine (Virg. Eclog. vii. 37), is a patronymic from Nereus, and applied to his daughters (Nereides, Nêreïdes, and in Homer Nêrêïdes) by Doris, who were regarded by the ancients as marine nymphs of the Mediterranean, in contra-distinction from the Naiades, or the nymphs of fresh water, and the Oceanides, or the nymphs of the great ocean (Eustath. ad Hom. p. 622). The number of the Nereides was fifty, but their names are not the same in all writers (Hom. Il. xviii. 39, &c.; Hes. Theog. 240, &c.; Pind. Isthm. vi. 8; Apollod. i. 2. § 7; Ov. Met. ii. 10, &c.; Virg. Aen. v. 825; Hygin. Fab. praef.) They are described as lovely divinities, and dwelling with their father at the bottom of the sea, and they were believed to be propitious to all sailors, and especially to the Argonauts (Hom. Il. xviii. 36, &c. 140; Apollod. i. 9. § 25; Apollon. Rhod. iv. 859, 930). They were worshipped in several parts of Greece, but more especially in sea-port towns. such as Cardamyle (Paus. iii. 2. § 5), and on the Isthmus of Corinth (ii. 1. § 7). The epithets given them by the poets refer partly to their beauty and partly to their place of abode. They were frequently represented in antiquity, in paintings, on gems, in relievoes and statues, and commonly as youthful, beautiful, and naked maidens, and often grouped together with Tritons and other marine monsters, in which they resemble the Bacchic routs. Sometimes, also, they appear on gems as half maidens and half fish, like mermaids, the belief in whom is quite analogous to the belief of the ancients in the existence of the Nereides.

source: www.mythindex.com

NYMPH DRYAD / NINFA DRIADE

oil on canvas (50 x 100 cm)

PRIVATE COLLECTION

THE DRYADES & OREIADES were the beautiful Nymphs of the trees, groves, woods and mountain forests. They were the ladies of the oaks and pines, poplar and ash, apple and laurel. For those known as Hamadryades, trees sprung up from the earth at their birth, trees to which their lives were closely tied. While the tree flourished, so did its resident nymph, but when it died she passed away with it.

source: http://www.theoi.com

NYMPH NEREID / NINFA NEREIDE

oil on canvas (50 x 100 cm)

€ 700,00

Nereis, or Nerine (Virg. Eclog. vii. 37), is a patronymic from Nereus, and applied to his daughters (Nereides, Nêreïdes, and in Homer Nêrêïdes) by Doris, who were regarded by the ancients as marine nymphs of the Mediterranean, in contra-distinction from the Naiades, or the nymphs of fresh water, and the Oceanides, or the nymphs of the great ocean (Eustath. ad Hom. p. 622). The number of the Nereides was fifty, but their names are not the same in all writers (Hom. Il. xviii. 39, &c.; Hes. Theog. 240, &c.; Pind. Isthm. vi. 8; Apollod. i. 2. § 7; Ov. Met. ii. 10, &c.; Virg. Aen. v. 825; Hygin. Fab. praef.) They are described as lovely divinities, and dwelling with their father at the bottom of the sea, and they were believed to be propitious to all sailors, and especially to the Argonauts (Hom. Il. xviii. 36, &c. 140; Apollod. i. 9. § 25; Apollon. Rhod. iv. 859, 930). They were worshipped in several parts of Greece, but more especially in sea-port towns. such as Cardamyle (Paus. iii. 2. § 5), and on the Isthmus of Corinth (ii. 1. § 7). The epithets given them by the poets refer partly to their beauty and partly to their place of abode. They were frequently represented in antiquity, in paintings, on gems, in relievoes and statues, and commonly as youthful, beautiful, and naked maidens, and often grouped together with Tritons and other marine monsters, in which they resemble the Bacchic routs. Sometimes, also, they appear on gems as half maidens and half fish, like mermaids, the belief in whom is quite analogous to the belief of the ancients in the existence of the Nereides.

source: www.mythindex.com