Claudio and Isabella

Claudio and Isabella is an 1850 Pre-Raphaelite oil painting by William Holman Hunt. It is based on a scene from William Shakespeare's Measure for Measure. In this scene, Isabella is made to choose between sacrificing her brother's life or sacrificing her virginity to Angelo. Hunt's image attempts to depict the characters' tangible emotions in the moment that this choice must be made.[1] Hunt summarized the moral as: ‘Thou shall not do evil that good may come.’[2]

Claudio and Isabella
Claudio: Death is a fearful thing
Isabella: And shamed life is hateful
ArtistWilliam Holman Hunt
Year1850
MediumOil on Mahogany
Dimensions997 cm × 668 cm (393 in × 263 in)
LocationTate Britain, London, UK

Isabella's purity is reflected by her upright position, her plain white habit, and the sun shining on her through the window, out of which a church can be seen in the distance. Her brother Claudio, shackled to the wall, clearly uncomfortable in both mind and body. He is turned away from his sister, ashamed of the circumstances that brought them here and confronted with the fear of his own imminent death.[1]

When it was first put on display at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1853 it was accompanied by a quotation from the play:[2]

'Tis too horrible!

The weariest, and most loathed worldly life, That age, ache penury and imprisonment Can lay on nature, is a paradise To what we fear of death.

In 1864 Hunt issued a pamphlet advertising the engraving of Claudio and Isabella, in which he summarised the picture's 'deep and noble moral' as 'Thou shall not do evil that good may come.'

— Measure for Measure, Act III, scene I

References
  1. Prettejohn, Elizabeth (2000). The Art of the Pre-Raphaelites. London. pp. 144–146.
  2. "Claudio and Isabella". Tate Britain. Retrieved 2019-03-12.
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