Unseen Danger
Lisa Draper
48” x 60”
Mixed Media Assembly
Available, For purchase inquiries, email lisa@draperfineart.com
Aeneid, Virgil
“Through pain I've learned to comfort suffering men.” ~Aeneid, Virgil
History
A Latin poem written between 29 and 19 BC, it tells the story of Aeneas’ wanderings in Italy after the defeat of Troy, accounted for more in full in The Iliad, and mentioned in The Odyssey.
Aeneas was already known to readers of the day, as he was a character in The Iliad. He travels to Italy, is caught up in a war in Italy, and eventually founds Rome. Thus Virgil tied Rome and Troy together in a breathtaking founding myth.
The Aeneid was written in 9,896 lines of dactylic hexameter, the same meter used in Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey (both of which were written in 8th Century BC, long before Virgil’s time). This comprises of six “feet” at a time, each “foot” being one short and two long syllables. Classical dactylic allowed for the substitution of two long syllables (called a spondee) in the place of a standard foot sometimes. The final foot would be a trochee (long and then short syllable), or a spondee (two long syllables, as mentioned above).
–⏕ | –⏕ | –⏕ | –⏕ | –⏑⏑ | –X
Artist Statement
Fun fact: because The Iliad is the prequel to this story, pages from The Iliad are on the back of the Trojan horse. Disappointingly, you can’t see them. But now you know they’re there!
Speaking of hidden things, the story of the Trojan horse is told in just a few pages in Book 2 of the Aeneid. In order to accomplish the impossible feat of overthrowing the Trojans, The Greeks build a wooden horse the size of a “mountain”, and fill it with their best warriors, chosen by lot. They roll it to the city gates, and the rest of the army sails away, as a sign they accepted their defeat.
The one goddess who attempts to warn the Trojans is ignored. Earthly counterparts are shunned, and even punished. The Trojan horse is dragged into the city and celebrated. Aeneas tells of being able to hear the armor of the soldiers inside the horse as they dragged it in, but dismissing the sounds as other things, choosing instead to blindly view it as a gift, just as the Greek armies had hoped.
This artwork was created with a raised, invisible layer surrounding the horse. It cannot be seen in photos online, and can only be truly observed in person, walking around it.
What a tragedy for the Trojans could have been prevented with only a little more of this same attention.