Dante's Midlife Crisis
Maker
Pam Watson
Production date
2002
Description
Oil on board painting by Pam Watson. Information from the artist: "Dante's 'Divine Comedy' begins: 'In the midway of this our mortal life, I found me in a gloomy wood, astray, Gone from the path direct...'. So when I found this takeaway shop, Waitoa became the setting for the first canto. Dante is lost in a dark and dismal wood when he sees a mountain with the sun rising over it – Mt Te Aroha. It is the 'Holy Hill', the mountain of the Lord, but when Dante tries to climb it he can't. He is stopped. First by a leopard and then by a lion and a wolf – all borrowed, along with the sun, from Blake's 'Dante Running from the Wild Beasts."
See full details
Object detail
Collection of Waikato Museum Te Whare Taonga o Waikato
Public comments
Be the first to comment on this object record.