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March 09, 2017
Mid-Morning Open Thread
Hat Tip: Bluebell
Joan Of Arc
Jules Bastien-Lepage
I always found this painting to be a bit odd, particularly because Joan looks a bit...nuts.
And it reminds me of a jigsaw puzzle. Yes, I am a child. What of it?
Joan of Arc, the medieval teenaged martyr from the province of Lorraine, gained new status as a patriotic symbol after France ceded the territory to Germany following the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71). Bastien-Lepage, a native of Lorraine, depicts the moment when Saints Michael, Margaret, and Catherine appear to Joan in her parents' garden, rousing her to fight against the English invaders in the Hundred Years War. When the painting was exhibited in the Salon of 1880, critics praised the expressiveness of the principal figure, but found the saints' presence at odds with Bastien-Lepage's naturalistic style.