Describing Death

Giovanni Martinellis early race as a Florentine painter is relatively unknown. It is documented that he moved to Florence in 1634. Prior to relocating, Martinelli produced Memento Mori (Death Comes to the Dinner Table). This piece has a comparable style to the Florentine painters Filippo T puckishiani and Anastagio Fontebuoni. Memento Mori is displayed in a go through narrative style. Martinelli created a colorful and dramatic scene that was underscored by the headlong arrival of death. Some translations state that Memento Mori means Remember, you shall die. Here, Martinelli portrays a root word of five individuals of varying ages. They appear to be from a wealthy stock. They pay expensive clothing and are moderaten at a dinner plug-in partaking in a party of sorts. They are gallivanting around a put off that is filled with an abundant collection of exotic fruits, pies, and pastries. Along with the food, Martinelli painted miscellaneous wine glasses that appear to be hand-cr afted and of the highest fashion. Giovanni used b in force(p), promising silken wear with colors ranging from yellow, to peach, to blue.The colors complement each figure, adding to their genius and desire for greed. These wealthy-looking sight appear roughly instantaneouslyto be in a rigid state of duress. On the far right gradient of the painting, we see, in dark shades, the resemblance of a skeleton holding up an hourglass, as if to say, cheers. This one-time jovial band of feasters is seen reacting to the new character intruding on their high-standing party. The faces offer gestures of blab shock and dismay.All the focus shifts from their colorful mealtime festivities to this arch nemesis, and back again. The skeletal metaphor of death leans into one mans shoulder. This man closest to death is in the act of clutching his heart. His eyes expatiate toward the figure of death and his mouth, just slightly ajar, appears to be ready to hollow open in utter wickedness. He, howe ver, is too dumbfounded by this spare figure of deaths close proximity to do anything that freeze in horror. ANALYSIS OF MEMENTO MORI There are cardinal men at the rear end of the table, farthermost from death.They are overly horrified. One man is seen posturing with arms wide-open, even though his is furthest from death. He is attempting to back away yet, at the uniform time, he is incapacitated and unable to allow the empty gaze of deaths romance for running will do no good to the mortal man, irrespective if he led a life of sin-hood or martyrdom. Morals were almost epidemic in Martinellis fresco reckons. Memento Mori is a nonher virtuous story-telling scene with moralistic intent. The era of this 17th degree Celsius creation occurred at a time when plague was a hearty, healthy killer.The deathful onslaught of plague, in all its pestilence, came to towns without warning. It attacked the poor and wealthy a standardized, caring little for a mortals status in regards to wealth, politics, or religion. To create the moral cloth surrounding the authors of death through plague, Martinelli displayed deep imagery between the late party-goers who were enjoying their food and intoxicating drinks. He contrasts these free-willing, wealthy individuals with the ghastlyeven coolingreality of death. He does so by casting deaths chin over one mans shoulder.This imagery adds power and personality to the fresco. Martinelli displays the image of death coming to this gathering alone and without emotion or guile. The lone figure of death is shown to uproot the lives of this group of healthy, stress-free peoplestartling the living daylights out of everyone, young and old. MODERN-DAY IRONY Today, approach four-hundred years after Giovanni Martinelli finished his last brush stroke to canvas, we persist in as close to the idolise of deaths atomic number 16 as the 17th century plague-ridden societies were. For 300 years plague hung over the lives of Europeans lik e an omnipresent cloud, said Mormando, who is an Italian studies professor at Boston College. This statement, today, holds frightening weight to our real-world current lifestyle. Today, terrorism, war, suicide bombing, and the like are the molds that cast this same skeletal image at our kitchen table. Terrorism is a specter that comes at us in galore(postnominal) forms anthrax, subway bombs, and suicide hijacker steer to the large death of September 11, 2001. Just as smallpox left wing past centuries in a state of despair and real fear, we, today, see how fear forces us to change our reality.This changing reality holds an ominous simile to the changes that the banqueters in Momento Mori faced. Martinellis plague painting is characteristic 17th century Italian. The horrific tendency of the subject matter never destroyed the utter beautyeven charismatic charmof the oils that he chose to mix in his representation of terror and deathly destruction. For in his era of epidemics and massive death, just a decade passed without plague haunting a town and saving it to its knees. When this painting was created, there wasnt anything small about death.It came in massive, near apocalyptic proportions, decimating generations in the blink of an eye. So, the timing of Martinellis piece was right in line with the mood of the generation. This connection further enlivened his work back then. Since we, in the dawn of the 21st century, can relate to massive death and fear through terrorism, war, and civil upheaval around the globe, it too adds empowering imagery to his age-old mastery. The imagery of Memento Mori is further encapsulated by the good images on these wealthy party-goers faces.The hand-crafted beautiful likeness on the faces of those liner death offers deep-rooted thinking that says As some of the Italians survived a plague-ridden epidemic, they move to look-over-their-shoulders awaiting the next surprise visit by the specter of death. Its sooner haunting ho w this parallels with what terrorism instills upon societies around the planet today. Plague paintings like Martinellis, some(prenominal) times, depicted a person pinching their nose to refrain from smelling the horror of death in the air.Martinelli, however, appeared to glaze over his moral of death and the fear of death by not rendering any people in his paintings to be abhorred by the scent of death. This may further enhance the real lifestyle of the wealthy in the 17th century they had more than they could fathom. So, was Martinelli a closet optimist? Or was his subliminal imagery set up to leave us with this question How can the rich keep up to ignore the constituent of death, and why dont they seem concerned with finding ship canal to better humanity instead of bettering their personal property and lavishness?In closing, we must also consider the element of hope and healing, and why it is not apparent in Memento Mori. We must consider the miasma hypothesis and its transmi ssion by way of corrupt air. Its the complete randomness of plague that Martinelli depicts so well that adds such force to this painting. As we bear to live in corrupt societies, it seems that the fear of death will continue to hang over our shoulders. Terrorism is likened to the countless plagues that washed over communities those many centuries ago. As death and terror come and go, the art of the masters outride untouched.