Shrine

Perhaps you can see a beautiful painting here. Perhaps it’s the chairs or the busts that stand out. Perhaps the light from the right catches your eye. Perhaps you can look at this and see a beautiful arrangement of all of the above. Bravo, curators.

But when I look at this I see a shrine. The painting is doubly flanked by the busts and the chairs. Light falls upon it. Royalty, often associated with divinity through divine right, inherits the Christian colour palatte of red, green, blue, and gold. We can see green in the curtains behind Marie Antoinette, blue and gold in her dress, and red and gold on the tablecloth. On the table is a crown resting on a rolled up blue gown perhaps with the fleur-de-lis in gold. The frame is gold. The chairs are predominantly red and gold. And at the centre of it all is an iconographic representation of royalty which connects us to divinity. How much more shrinelike could it be?