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The Troubling Muses - De Chirico (1917-1919)

The Troubling Muses is a painting (97 × 67 cm, oil on canvas) by the Italian painter Giorgio de Chirico created between 1917 and 1919. At least one copy of the work exists, located at the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich (94 × 62 cm, gouache on paper). The artwork depicts an open space where two classical statues are prominently positioned: one upright and the other seated on a pedestal. Both figures, which have the head of a tailor’s mannequin, are surrounded by various objects, while in the background stands a third male statue. The perspective is distorted and converges in the background with the representation of the Estense Castle of Ferrara, here flanked by a factory. Although the image is clear, the atmosphere is unrealistically silent and disorienting, aided by the warm colors and the static, intense light.
According to Eugenio Borgna: “In the painting, the climax of anguish and despair certainly arises from the eyeless figures and their desiccated faces: evoking an immediate impression of a astonished and lacerating silence.”
The presence of various symbols within the painting makes its interpretation challenging. Nevertheless, the castle in the background is a reference to Ferrara, the city where metaphysical painting was born (the stage of the crucial meeting with Carlo Carrà as well as a place for fundamental aesthetic reflections), while the upright mannequin in the foreground is presumed to represent Hippodamia, a mythological character who, during the battle of the Centaurs and the Lapiths, awaited the outcome of the clash with unease, a sentiment that inspired the title of the work.