Death & Life Allegories in Art

Have been into this type of imagery a bit lately:

330px-hans_baldung_025.jpg

holbein-death.png

There’s another great image in a book I found on the circus. It depicts a clown with a contraption on his back which, when put into use makes it look like a skeleton is chasing him. It’s sort of this harness that attaches and juts out from his back, with a then obviously home-made skeleton with jointed limbs. It’s a routine widely used in American circuses of the 1930’s or so. It’s a fantastic image, I think, because it overtly depicts the hidden (occult) side of clowns: that it’s death chasing them as they laugh and cavort despite it all that makes them funny, pitiable and terrifying all at once.


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This entry was written by happy thanksgiving, y'all!, posted on October 11, 2009 at 12:51 pm.

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2 Comments

  1. Michael Foley
    Posted October 12, 2009 at 1:22 am | Permalink

    What’s the name of the book?

  2. Ian
    Posted October 13, 2009 at 2:07 pm | Permalink

    Found via a follower of mine on Twitter:

    http://img202.yfrog.com/i/io3b.jpg/

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