Truth Coming Out of Her Well by Jean-Léon Gérôme - 1896 - 91 cm × 72 cm Musée Anne de Beaujeu Truth Coming Out of Her Well by Jean-Léon Gérôme - 1896 - 91 cm × 72 cm Musée Anne de Beaujeu

Truth Coming Out of Her Well

oil on canvas • 91 cm × 72 cm
  • Jean-Léon Gérôme - May 11, 1824 - January 10, 1904 Jean-Léon Gérôme 1896

I know it is a very weird painting!

Beginning in the mid1890s, in the last decade of his life, Gérôme made at least four paintings personifying Truth as a nude woman, either thrown into, at the bottom of, or emerging from a well. The imagery arises from a translation of an aphorism of the philosopher Democritus, "Of truth we know nothing, for truth is in a well." The nudity of the model may arise from the expression, la vérité nue, the naked truth.

It has been assumed that the painting was a comment on the Dreyfus affair, but some art historians argue that Gérôme's images of Truth and the well were part of his ongoing diatribe against Impressionism, which is kind of funny.

The multiple interpretations of the painting's enigmatic meaning prompted one of the museum's curators to say, "This is our Mona Lisa."

We leave you with this weirdness and a small remark, that art history is full of anecdotes. See you tomorrow and watch out for wells!

P.S. And here are 10 most scandalous nudes in art (NSFW)!

P.P.S. Check here our list of 10 best movies related to art in the time of quarantine <3