Unconscious Rivals

Unconscious Rivals: Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema

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Art Type: Oil Painting
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Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema Oil Painting - Unconscious Rivals

Work Overview: Unconscious Rivals
Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema
Date: 1893
Style: Romanticism
Genre: genre painting
Media: oil on panel
45 × 63 cm
Location: Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery, Bristol, UK

Alma-Tadema's female figures have a slightly bored pleasure-seeking attitude, as if they were pampered courtesans. There is little action in Alma-Tadema's paintings; here the two women are just probably waiting for a lover. The composition is balanced by the flowers in bloom.

Unconscious Rivals is an example of artist Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema’s interest in depicting a romanticized (and, it should be noted, very Victorian) interpretation of ancient Rome. And while the setting of this painting - with its magnificently decorated barrel vault in the background - does not conform to any existing Roman models, Lawrence Alma-Tadema has succeeded in creating an atmosphere that evokes the splendor of Rome quite beautifully.

The meaning and significance of the painting’s title are not immediately obvious, but one can guess that the artist is referring to the idea that the two women represented in the work are somehow rivals for the attention of an unseen lover. However, the details in Unconscious Rivals are revealing. On the far left there is a statue of Cupid (known to the ancient Greeks as Eros) that is based on a sculpture from the Capitoline Museum in Rome. Cupid is of course the Roman god of love and desire, so the inclusion of this statue suggests love and its abundant pleasures.

In addition to Cupid, there is also a subtle reference to something with which ancient Romans were intimately familiar - gladiators and the gladiatorial games. For on the right side of the painting there is a partially visible statue that portrays a reclining gladiator. Virile gladiators were often the celebrities of the day, and they were much adored especially by female aristocrats. It is therefore possible that Lawrence Alma-Tadema was hinting at a love triangle involving the pair of women and a handsome gladiator.

An example of Alma-Tadema's meticulous painting style, which, as the exhibition shows, improved with age, [this painting] depicts a scene bathed in an orange light. This is set off by pink flowers, and falls on two Patrician women lounging in a villa whilst perhaps awaiting the return of a (shared?) male lover: the Cupid sculpture here further reflects love and dalliance. But the expressions of the women are hard to decipher. The reason for their rivalry is only hinted at by the sculpted gladiator foot which breaks through from the right-hand edge of the frame. The full sculpture remains out of sight, like the true reason for their rivalry.

Alma-Tadema and [his second wife] Laura spent much time travelling and many of his works, including Unconscious Rivals, draw upon examples of colour and sculpture which he had seen in Roman museums, photos of which were in his collection. The couple also travelled to Pompeii in the 1890s and Alma-Tadema saw the progress of excavations there and took great interest in them, visiting the site daily. Prettejohn argues that this particular painting's legibility is fragmented, with the fragment of the large sculpture making it more so — as Joanna Paul suggests (116). Such fragmentation and consequent lack of comprehensibility is part of what makes Alma-Tadema's works easy to skip past, but it is also part of what brings the viewer back to them. There is something intriguing and inviting, something within the paintings which is unsaid and cannot ever be resolved.

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Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema

Work Overview