Title | Creator | Date | Era | City | Country | Emotional Sum (Sense of Life or emotional World View) | Theme | |
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Repose | Painter: John White Alexander | 1895 | 1900s | New York | United States |
Life is extravagant and lush and sensual. |
Feminine Sensuality is a main theme, though one can argue that a related (equal theme or sub-theme) is: The Lushness of the Material World. The dramatic draped womanly figure pressing against a divan, whose figure is clearly oulined, shares the visual dominance of the painting along with the magnificent sweeps of her dress and the giant pillows, the massive backrest, and even the strong elements of the floor material and the golden back wall. All together a remarkable composition. |
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Rembrandt | Director: Korda Alexander | 1936 | 1931-1950 | United Kingdom |
Life is hard as an independent spirit, and wealth will elude you, but you will be happy, after a fashion. |
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Real Chiesa di San Lorenzo (Royal Church of St. Lawrence) | Architect: Guarino Guarini | 1680 | 1600s | Torino (Turin) | Italy |
The world is perfected. The joy of seeing complexity that is simplicity, i.e., that the rich complex vision arises from simple elements which because of their arrangement provide layers of visual thrills. |
Complex, soaring geometric order. |
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Real Adventure, The | Author: Henry Kitchell Webster | 1915 | United States |
Life is wonderful as long as you realize that life has to be earned the hard way. |
Creating your self is the only way to live. |
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Rashomon | Director: Akira Kurosawa | 1950 | 1931-1950 | Japan |
The world is terrible and full of disasters and mankind is awful and pathetic. |
Objectivity is a myth -- everyone sees a different reality, a different "story". |
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Rape of Polyxena, The | Sculptor: Pio Fedi | 1866 | 1800s |
Strength and complex beauty are central. Vitality, passion and action are hallmarks of this work. |
Life is complex strife, entwined with strong god-like characters. |
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Psyche | Author: Phyllis Brett Young | 1959 | Canada |
Optimistic, Hopeful, even under terrible circumstances. |
We are beings of self-made soul |
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Pirelli Calendar Diver | Photographer: Uwe Ommer | 1984 | Italy |
Women can be strong, dynamic and unconsciously beautiful. |
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Pieta | Sculptor: Michelangelo Buonarotti | 1500 | 1500s |
Resignation in the face of tragedy. |
Recognition and acceptance of a great personal loss. |
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Owl and the Sparrow | Director: Stephane Gauger | 2007 | 1991-2010 | Saigon | Vietnam |
A child shows sweetness and strength and determination. |
Searching for family, for soulmates. |
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Othello: the Moor of Venice | Playwright: William Shakespeare | 1603 | 1600s | Stratford-on-Avon | United Kingdom |
Malevolence and horrible tragedy is unrelieved. Evil is potent. |
A great man can be gullible and controlled by an evil character. Or, an evil character can have potency in the world, because of the weakness of a good man. |
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Old Man with a Young Boy | Painter: Domenico Ghirlandaio | 1490 | 1400s | Florence | Italy |
Human companionship or family closeness is real. |
Quiet familial love. (A grandfather (perhaps) gazing upon a grandson, and vice versa, in a clear moment of happy communion.) |
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Of Human Bondage | Maugham, W. Somerset: | 1915 | 1900 - 1950 | United Kingdom |
Life is a fearful gray spread of actions and in-actions without genuine values. We are all deformed in mind or spirit and should accept convention as demanded by those around us. |
Man's life is outside his control. Conventionality is the final ideal. |
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Octopus | Schaefer, Taf Lebel: | 2005 |
Playful. |
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Niobe | Sculptor: unknown | c. 200 BC | Rome | Italy |
Human action is beautiful. |
Life is movement. |
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National Farmers' Bank | Architect: Louis Sullivan | 1907 | 1900 - 1950 | Owatonna MN | United States |
Being able to breath freely -- expansively, and feeling that there are no limits to what man can do. |
The world is expansively, infinitely rich. |
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Much Ado About Nothing | Playwright: William Shakespeare | 1993 | 1991-2010 |
Sweetness and light and beauty are what the world is made of. |
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Monster, The | Director: Roberto Benigni | 1994 | 1991-2010 | Italy |
Just laughter and more of the same. |
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Merry Widow (Die Lustige Witwe) | Composer: Franz Lehar | 1905 | 1900s | Vienna | Austria |
Love brings gaiety and joy to life. |
Love can be gay and tender, solemn and lighthearted, painful and joyous. |
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Mad Men | Creator: Matthew Weiner | 2007 | Los Angeles | United States |
Men must sell their souls in order to live, and they are chauvinist pigs to boot. And women are sluts. Dark. |
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Love Actually | Director and Screenwriter: Richard Curtis | 2003 | 1991-2010 | United Kingdom |
Romantic love, family love, filial love, and the love of friendship are of central importance to human existence, and are possible to achieve. |
Wonderful experiences of love are found in many forms and places. |
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Laocoon (Laocoön and His Sons) | Sculptor: Agesander | 1st century BCE to 1st century CE | 500 BCE - 1 CE | Rome | Italy |
Life is a desperate, agonizing struggle. |
The heroic but agonizing defeat of Men. This sculpture certainly represents at the same time the heroic nature of men but cast into an impossible situation that can only be tragic. |
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Landfall | Shute, Nevil: | 1940 | 1900 - 1950 | United Kingdom |
Heroes and Heroines are self-made, by anyone at any level of intelligence who seriously pursues what is important in their lives. |
Truth will triumph -- with perseverance. |
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La Grande Nevrose | Loysel, Jacques: | c.1896 | 1800s | Paris | France |
The dynamic female body is beautiful and exciting. Although it may not explicitly suggest it, the nude and its tense position could be felt as erotic. |
An animated female body is a vessel of perfection. |
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La Gomena (Towing a Boat) | Painter: Ettore Tito | 1909 | 1900s | Italy |
There is great effort in life, and a woman can be the master of it. This painting is a curious combination of romantic heroism and 19th century genre naturalism. It has a visual dynamism and dramatic content that is strongly romantic, yet the subject is the prosaic task of pulling a boat out of the water. |
The will and the power of a woman. Implacable determination. |