The 2 quills
Compounding that friction between the stressed flux and sombre stillness of Marat’s discrepant palms is David’s seemingly redundant choice to insert into the stripped-down scene not one ink-dipped quill, however two. Between the lifeless fingers of his proper hand, Marat pinches a writing feather, nonetheless moist with ink. Observe its shaft upwards from the ground, previous the white plume, to the upturned crate that Marat was utilizing as a desk, and we uncover a second quill mendacity beside the crouching inkpot. This quill’s darkish nib factors menacingly within the route of the deadly stab wound, and poses a pointed query: was it a knife that killed Marat or phrases? In instances of heated politics, it’s by no means clear which is mightier, the pen or the sword. As we’ll see, in David’s portray the quill and blade are themselves doppelgängers. They sharpen one another.
The 2 letters
As soon as detected, the doubling of proof within the portray immediately multiplies. Facet-by-side on the centre of the canvas we discover not one letter however two, every composed by a distinct hand. Between the traces of those two paperwork, your entire plot of the portray is written. The be aware that Marat clutches in his left hand is positioned by the artist in such a means that we will simply learn how Corday, unknown to Marat, baited him into inviting her in, and took benefit of his benevolent nature: “It’s sufficient that I’m very sad”, Corday disingenuously pleads in her letter, “to have a proper to your kindness.” The message is obvious: it’s Marat’s kindness that killed him.
Marat assassiné/Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique (BruxellesSlightly below Corday’s letter, teetering on the sting of the field, is one other missive composed by Marat himself – the doc he was apparently writing when she struck. This be aware is held down by an assignat (or revolutionary cash), thought by students to be the first-ever depiction of paper foreign money in Western artwork. In his letter, Marat selflessly pledges 5 livres to a struggling pal of the Revolution: “that mom of 5 kids whose husband died in defence of the fatherland”. Even in demise, we’re advised, Marat bleeds generosity.
The 2 girls
The 2 letters do greater than draw the axes of luring and mendacity, kindness and redemption, in opposition to which the portray’s story twists. The 2 letters conjure ghosts – two of them. First is Corday’s, the conniving murderer who slipped into Marat’s house with a protracted knife beneath her scarf. The second, additionally unseen, is that of the struggling widow whom Marat was intent on serving to, whose husband died preventing for the Republic. The face-off between feminine forces, one personifying good and the opposite evil, has a protracted custom in artwork historical past. For hundreds of years artists have staged the wrestle between saintliness and sinfulness as a bitter contest between robust girls. Renaissance artist Paolo Veronese’s well-known Allegory of Advantage and Vice, c 1565, portrays one girl beckoning Hercules in the direction of honour whereas one other, a protracted knife hidden behind her again, tempts him in the direction of pleasure. David updates the allegory for the period of Revolution. In The Dying of Marat, it’s the soul of a nation that’s at stake.
