Ehepaar

This is double profile portrait of a married couple, as from it German title. They both stand, his own a volitional expression, hers a more enigmatic gaze of seduction. They could be statues, in their metal hues: he is bronze, she is copper. They stand upon a ravaging sea. This couple could be a sculpture rescued out of a cemeterial chapel, dating back to the first decades of 20th century. This painting is strongly German, not only by its title. The proud expression of the man reminds the two poems that J.L. Borges wrote for Albrecht Duerer’s Knight, Death and the Devil (“Tue eres aleman, Caballero”). The enigmatic woman could well be a Mermaid, an Undine, inextricable from the waves below. Has their life passed by, could it be remembered at all, or is this just a nice sculpture of two now unknown, yet rich enough in their past to commission a funerary portrait of that quality? May be, on the opposite, that they are still alive. And their portrait is a sign of a magic spell that has let them immortal and forever inseparable.