The Ecstasy of St Teresa vs. Lindsay Lohan passed out
1652 vs. 2007
This comparison, you've probably seen before. The unfortunate photo taken of Lindsay Lohan circa the peak of her self-destruction until hitting rock bottom in handcuffs in 2012. None the less, this comparison turned into a meme and spread across the internet. There are obvious comical similarities between Gian Lorenzo Bernini's statue The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa and Lohan the night before she checked into her third Rehab. The visual difference are quite contradictory as Saint Teresa lays back with her eyes closed as she connects with the Holy Spirit. And like Lohan on Memorial Day 2007, she looks unconscious. From the wiki page of the St Teresa sculpture, it describes:
The Ecstasy of Saint Teres or in Italian: L'Estasi di Santa Teresa or Santa Teresa in estasi, is the central sculptural group in white marble set in an elevated aedicule in the Cornaro Chapel, Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome. It was designed and completed by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, the leading sculptor of his day, who also designed the setting of the Chapel in marble, stucco and paint. It is generally considered to be one of the sculptural masterpieces of the High Roman Baroque. It pictures Teresa of Ávila.
It's quite comical to notice once you start looking for the similarities between tabloid images and classic works of artwork and masterpieces. It's quite interesting once you began to notice the strange similarities. Most people think that photos taken by paparazzi and put in tabloids and gossip magazines are quite vapid and a waste a time. But in reality when you place images from pop culture next to their precise analogues in art history, you began to look at the tabloid photo in a different way and it might continue to resonate with you throughout the day. At least that's what happened to me once I began to notice it. That's why this series began.
There are obviously tons of differences between pop culture and art history. There's this stigma that only one of these things can be enjoyed independently from the other. Hollywood celebrities, reality tv stars, and social media personalities are all just byproducts of visual media. We engage with them in a similar way that other societies in the past would engage with paintings. Whether it was deciphering Picasso's work in the Expressionism period, or admiring Botticelli's famous Birth of Venus painting in the Italian Renaissance.
