“La Source” from the original oil painting by French Neoclassical painter Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres
Measuring 6.5”x11”.
The painting depicts a nude woman standing upright between an opening in the rocks and holding in her hands a pitcher, from which water flows. She thus represents a water source or spring, for which source is the normal French word, and which, in classical literature, is sacred to the Muses and a source of poetic inspiration. She stands between two flowers, with their “vulnerability to males who wish to pluck them”, and is framed by ivy, plant of Dionysus the god of disorder, regeneration, and ecstasy. The water she pours out separates her from the viewer, as rivers mark boundaries of which the crossing is symbolically important.