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Orazio Gentileschi's paintings of women and divine love
Gentileschi painted three women challenged in their devotion to God reflecting the Catholic belief that divine ecstasy can only be achieved when a woman chooses freely to love God. Created by Getty Museum.
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Video transcript
(religious music) Male narrator: We think that these three
paintings were created as an ensemble to invite comparison and suggest
meaning to a culture heavily steep in Christian theology. Gentileschi chose his subjects
from three different sources. One is taken from Greco-Roman mythology, one from the Hebrew scriptures,
and one from Christian rights. In each case the subject concerns
a woman's relationship with God, particularly concerning love and sex. Each woman is engaged by
engazing out of the frame at something we can't see. It is the presence of God. In each of the compositions,
Gentileschi uses the principal gesture to help tell the essence of the story. Lot's daughter points back
toward the burning Sodom, where all of mankind has
presumed and perished as if to justify their
actions with their father. (religious music) Danae looks a bit apprehensive as
she throws up her arm in a gesture perhaps of welcome, or perhaps of
abandonment to the inevitability of Jupiter's arrival
in the shower of gold. Danae had no choice in the matter, she had to abandon
herself to Jupiter's loss. She did not have free will
and was at the mercy of faith. Unlike Danae who reaches up
toward the shower of gold, Mary Magdalene is completely immobilized
by the awesome presence of the divine. Mary Magdalene led a wanting
life, filled with sexual sin until she encountered Christ and converted becoming one of his closest followers. She has said to have ended
her days in Southern France where she inhabited a cave. Abandoning herself
completely to God's will. (religious music)