초록 열기/닫기 버튼
This paper interprets the artwork that use motifs from Alfred Tennyson’s poem, “The Lady of Shalott” viewing them from the axes of both the social and liberal natures of art, which are the main art theories of the Victorian age. The Lady of Shalott is historically intriguing in its content that encompasses both art theories of that time. These are best exemplified by the artists John Ruskin and Walter Pater. The symbols in the rich visual elements described in the poem correspond with the images of the modern artist. The Lady of Sharlott is a poem of the 1840s, and it reemerges as artwork at the end of 1870s when Aestheticism was active. The modern artists that are reproduced through the images of the Lady of Shalott speak for this Aestheticism. She is someone who can be liberated from her status, society and history as well as from herself. As an artist, the Lady of Shalott agonizes over the conflict between artistic devotion and social responsibility. She is liberated from her anguish through her death and becomes a fully liberated being. In other words, the Lady of Shalott is an artist who realizes “art for art’s sake” and symbolizes the victory and rebirth of her art which overcomes all the ethics and rules of the material world.