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Mischief and Repose by John William Godward looks a lot like a representation of most sister dynamics.

Your older sister is sleeping on the couch and she looks super peaceful and relaxed. What, as a little sister, must you do in this situation? You must tickle her awake with a dress pin, obviously. There is really no other option in this scenario. You can’t pass up an opportunity to mess with her like that because who knows when the next opportunity will be?

You may have guessed from the title but this painting is of Mischief and Repose. They exist in a world of wealth and leisure as indicated by Repose’s napping on a tiger-skin rug and all of the not working going on in this piece. The room is made of marble and a variety of other fancy materials, speaking of which, note the women’s not very effective, completely see-through dresses. I mean why bother putting on anything at all if it’s just going to show your birthday suits anyway? This could possibly have something to do with the fact that a man painted this in the late nineteenth century.

But on the other hand, these women are not looking at us or even inviting us to look at them. They almost look like statues, which would make sense as John William Godward was part of the “Marble School” of art-making. As evidenced by the incredible detail of the marble walls here, marble was kind of his ~thing~. After the discovery of the ruins of Pompeii in 1748, Neoclassicism happened. Many artists became obsessed with Greek and Roman lives of leisure and tranquility like this one. Godward was one of the best of the bunch, which is made obvious by everything about this piece.

 

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Here is what Wikipedia says about Mischief and Repose


John William Godward, Mischief and Repose, 1895, J. Paul Getty Museum

Mischief and Repose is an 1895 oil-on-canvas painting by British artist John William Godward. It has been held by the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles since 1979. Godward painted a second, smaller painting, with a different composition but the same title, in 1909.

Godward's 1895 painting depicts an interior scene from Ancient Greece or Rome, following the Neoclassical tradition of Lawrence Alma-Tadema. It depicts two auburn-haired young women, both dressed in long flowing robes modelled on an ancient chiton, made of a sheer material, respectively blue and grey, and tied at the waist. For the two female subjects, Godward used his regular models, Hetty Pettigrew and Lily Pettigrew. It is signed and dated on the multicoloured marble wall in the upper left corner, "J. W. GODWARD '95". The landscape composition measures 60.6 cm × 133 cm (23.9 in × 52.4 in).

The first woman to the left ("Repose") is lying on a tiger skin spread over a marble bench, with her right hand lifted behind her head and her left arm sprawling outward. To the right, a second woman ("Mischief") is kneeling on a black animal skin on the floor, attempting to disturb the other's slumbers: Mischief is reaching out her hand, holding a long white dress pin over the forehead of Repose. A second dress pin lies on the floor, beside a discarded hair ribbon. To the left, the floor has large white marble tiles, and to the right, small tesserae of a white mosaic with a black patterned border. The bench is a white marble with light grey veins, and the wall behind is clad with panels of several richly coloured and patterned marbles. A purple curtain with a gold border hangs to the right. Neither of the women engages with the viewer, and the cold academic style of the painting and their pale skin makes each as a petrified statue, like the rest of the marble room.

The painting was bought from the artist by the art dealer Léon Henri Lefèvre in 1895. It was sold at Christie's in 1924 by Sir Henry Grayson, and passed through the hands of several deals and collectors, including Nathan Mitchell and H. Aron. It was sold by J. Woolf at Christie's in 1938 and acquired by J. Paul Getty; after his death in 1976, his estate passed the work to the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles in 1979.


John William Godward, Mischief and Repose, 1909

Godward completed a second painting with the same title in 1909, about half the size at 38.4 cm × 76.9 cm (15.1 in × 30.3 in) and with a somewhat different composition, in which a single woman reclines outdoors on a tiger skin, glancing mischievously at the viewer. This later version was sold at Christie's in 2008 for £181,250.

Check out the full Wikipedia article about Mischief and Repose