Inspiration
The inspiration was classical literature as seen throughout this painter's career. The artist would take ancient texts, as well as more recent Victorian poetry, and take out elements as inspiration for individual paintings. Over time he developed strong technical skills in displaying architecture, clothing and scenes from nature that matched those same themes.
Description
One immediately recognises this painting as capturing the famous tale of Pandora opening her box. Artist Waterhouse adds little else to this scene other than some trees in the background which help to create the particular atmosphere in which this young lady carefully opens this beautifully crafted box.
Behind her is a small pond which trickles down to her level, suggesting a tranquil setting without any other distractions. The artist wanted to ensure that the viewer's eye was also not distracted from the main subject of the painting. The model is particularly pale-skinned, as with most Waterhouse muses, and this gives an impression of purity and vulnerability.
Pandora is dressed in a translucent blue dress which features patterned detail around the sagging neckline as well as around her feet. Waterhouse would often hang the robes down on his women, revealing extra flesh in a seductive manner which may have proved controversial with some during the Victorian era.
The scene captures just the moment at which she opens the box, and Waterhouse liked to create suspense within his paintings, as most viewers would have already been well aware of the story of Pandora, and what was about to occur.
Related Artists who also used Pandora for Inspiration
John William Waterhouse was certainly not the only artist to make use of Pandora's Box as inspiration for their work. Even just looking at artists closely related to Waterhouse, we can immediately find several artworks from the likes of Lawrence Alma-Tadema, with a beautiful watercolour of Pandora from 1881 and also a more famous oil painting by Dante Gabriel Rossetti in 1871.
The story itself comes from Greek mythology, dating it many thousands of years ago. It spoke, actually, of a large jar used for storage, and it was only mis-translations that created this idea of Pandora's box, that originally came directly from Pandora in Hesiod's Works and Days.
The tale has now become a common turn of phrase, meaning the opening and release of potential troubles, which are perhaps hard to judge of their danger before they have been set free. There is also a feeling that returning them to whence they came would also be a particularly arduous task.
"Don't open Pandora's box," some would say in order to warn against such an action. In this example the artist gives the biggest focus to Pandora herself, whilst other interpretations have placed more of a focus on the box itself, perhaps even going into detail on what could be found inside.
Large Image of Pandora
This stunning artwork is included in larger format below. Notice the detail on the box itself, as well as the details of stone and shrubbery which cover the background. Pandora's dress also carries a pretty, patterned design. Most impressive is the handling of the female form, which was something that Waterhouse mastered to a high level, after years of practice. This would dominate his work, both his drawings and his paintings too.
Pandora
