Curriculum Materials: Art in America
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Image 26 Bob Thompson Questions: |
Inspiration
Thompson freely based the
composition of Homage to Nina
Simone on a 17th-century painting,
Bacchanaleóthe Adrians, by the famous French painter
Nicolas Poussin. The American artist had studied this
painting at the Louvre museum in Paris. Although
Thompson admired Poussin's
composition, he did not literally copy any aspect of the
older work. With bold colors and loose brushstrokes, he
transformed aspects of Poussin's picture into a subjective
response to the music and social atmosphere of the 1960s.
The subject of Poussin's painting must have appealed to the
young American artist; it shows a bacchanal, a celebration
honoring the Roman wine god, Bacchus. The French painting
also associates music with having a good time. A woman in
blue strumming a guitar in Poussin's painting inspired the
blue figure of Nina Simone playing
guitar in the center of Thompson's
homage.
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