Death+the+Friend

The Side of Death We Aren’t Used To  Alfred Rethel was a German painter who lived through one of the worst pandemics in human history, the cholera pandemic. Rethel’s painting “Death the Friend” shows a peaceful depiction of death, through the unique purpose of this painting using its characters and background as well as the time period it was painted in. His concept for this artwork depicts death in a different light, one that is far different than his previous paintings as well as other paintings during his time period.  The purpose of this painting is exactly the same as its title which is to portray death as more of a positive entity rather than something which is feared and evil. The grim reaper looks as if he is mourning the death of the belfry as if he and the belfry were “friends”. The whole concept of this painting shows the grim reaper in a different light. He is wearing a seashell on his cloak which symbolizes fertility and love and he’s looking down with an agonizing expression over the death of the belfry. Rethel depicted the grim reaper as a skeleton which is similar to how most people perceive him to be however he is wearing friar clothing. The outfit of grim reaper further supports the main concept of this painting which is that the grim reaper isn’t an evil entity which gains pleasure from undertaking people. Another possibility of why the grim reaper is mourning is because he knows he has to reap the friar of life which means the grim reaper isn’t a bad thing he just has to do bad things which make him a negative entity in everyone’s eyes. Rethel does a very good job of showing the other side to the grim reaper, one which no one notices. Another interesting part of this painting is the sun, it could be interpreted as either rising or setting. The significance of the sunset is that it signifies the end of life while a rising sun signifies the starting of life. The vagueness that Rethel was trying to emphasize is that it’s the ending of this man life which the sunset symbolizes or the starting of a new journey for the man in the afterlife which the sunrise symbolizes. Another thing to note is the color strategy of this painting. The dark and light shadings of each character say a lot because the belfry and most of the room are shaded lightly because of the sun shining on them however the face of the grim reaper is shaded darker. The darker shading of the grim reapers face could further attribute to the stereotype of the grim reaper being evil while the lighter shading of the belfry due to the sun being shined on him says that he could possibly be ascending to heaven or something positive.

 Rethel lived through one of the deadliest periods of human, the cholera pandemic. This pandemic took over 20 million lives during its 22-year span across Europe and Asia. It is only natural that this biological disaster inspired artists to create artworks which represented this time period. Rethel towards the end of his life painted artworks exactly like that, ones that represent death. However, this particular artwork concept was very abnormal for him and the time period which he lived in because it paints death as a positive and caring entity rather than an evil one. This painting was actually painted as an apology to his previous work “Death the Avenger”, which was a skeleton playing a violin made of bones. Rethel must have obviously been disturbed at what he witnessed in order to create this piece. This painting represented the cholera outbreak in Paris during the carnival season and it haunted many of his artist friends, thus came the “Death the Friend” painting (Wikipedia). Both of the paintings allowed him to gain prominence across Europe as an artist.  The point of Alfred Rethel’s “Death the Friend” was to show death in its most tranquil form and this piece of work truly does it. It goes against the stereotypes and set standards of what we are all used to as well as what people at the time were used to. This painting represents the caring, mournful and loving side of death which people aren’t used to. It is a great example of what people can see when they step back and try to think of something with a different mindset.

Bibliography Ilkay, Hilary. "Faces of Death." Lapham's Quarterly. Lapham's Quarterly, 31 Dec. 2013. Web. 24 Jan. 2017. Pollefyes, Patrick. "Various Representation of Death." Various Representation of Death. La Mort Dans L' Art, 1996. Web. 24 Jan. 2017. "Alfred Rethel." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 24 Jan. 2017 Chilvers, Ian. The Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2009. Print.