Sleep in Art and Literature

Colin M. Shapiro, Deena Sherman and Meir H. Kryger

It appears that every man’s insomnia is as different from his neighbor’s as are their daytime hopes and aspirations.

The scientist explores the functions, mechanisms and pathologies of sleep (Fig. 1-1). Visual artists, on the other hand, are not concerned with these matters; instead, when representing sleep, a number of themes repeatedly emerge. They have intense fascination with mythology, dreams, religious themes, the parallel between sleep and death, reward, abandonment of conscious control, healing, a depiction of innocence and serenity, and the erotic.

Figure 1-1 Mahla Shapiro, Light to Deep and Dreaming Sleep, 2008.

The subject of sleep is revisited in art time and time again. Why do artists return to this inactive, common, basic human function? Certainly, a sleeping Venus is not as exciting as a dramatization of a bombing on a Spanish town or as uplifting as a starry night. The appeal of sleep lies in the fact that, although it is common, it is extremely complex. A sleeping woman takes on the posture of death but is very much alive. She is conscious but not cognizant. She lies physically in reality, but her thoughts run in fantasy. Sleep delights, frightens, regenerates, and may even lead to fatigue. It can overpower like a heavy, irrepressible fog or elude us like the sweet thrills of happiness.

Furthermore, although sleep is a basic human function, it is a unique experience for everybody. Thus, just as every man’s sleeplessness differs from his neighbor’s, so does his sleep. Sleep is a necessity and every person does it (or hopes to), but the actual experience cannot be shared. When one goes to sleep, one falls alone, and when one enters dreamland, one walks by one’s self. Here lies the appeal for artists. This inactive state contains so many connotations, evokes a large array of emotions, and holds an abundance of internal activity. How does one execute through painting one’s experiences and thoughts on sleep? Artists encounter a great barrier to overcome in trying to convey a multifaceted action whose origins lie in inaction. It is extremely difficult for an artist to separate one sleeping figure who may represent strength in sleep from another that symbolizes vulnerability.

This chapter explores the various devices and methods artists use to articulate their explorations and understandings of sleep. Furthermore, it investigates the different themes and ideas that artists have had about this mysterious human experience.

Mythology

One way artists explore sleep is through mythology. Artists take advantage of the viewer’s knowledge of and familiarity with the characters, stories, and settings of myth. This allows the artist to convey his or her definition of sleep by immersing it in these visual mythical cues. This is accomplished once the viewer recognizes these cues because it forces the viewer to ask, “What are the implications of sleep in the context of the story?”

An example of this is Sandro Botticelli’s Mars and Venus (Fig. 1-2). In this painting, the fully clothed Venus sits at the left, upright and alert, whereas the sleeping Mars on the right lies languidly, incapacitated, exposed, and vulnerable. Venus appears to be in control while Mars is reduced to being a plaything for the baby satyrs. Thus, this painting likens the state of sleep to weakness. It is a powerful force that can overtake the god of war. Sleep is undesirable because it is capable of lowering the defenses of someone as formidable as the god of war. The god of war becomes subject to humiliation. Furthermore, he has become prey to the outside world. This power of sleep is often not appreciated by patients, even those who suffer from sleep disorders, who may need to be reminded, for example, that sleep deprivation is used as a technique of torture. In other words, sleep is so highly necessary that “take those sleeping pills” may be the simplistic mantra.

Figure 1-2 Sandro Botticelli, Mars and Venus, ca. 1483. National Gallery of London.

Lorenzo Lotto’s Sleeping Apollo (Fig. 1-3) portrays sleep in a manner similar to that of Botticelli’s Mars and Venus. Once again, the sexes are divided; the naked female Muses are on the left and the slumbering Apollo sits on the right. Fame, who flies above Apollo, is ready to desert him and join the other Muses. The Muses have taken advantage of the sleeping Apollo to abandon their clothes and arts to frolic about.

Figure 1-3 Lorenzo Lotto, Sleeping Apollo, ca. 1530. Szepmuveseti Museum, Budapest.

Like Mars, Apollo is unaware of the activities of the waking world. The effects of sleep in both paintings produce a comic reaction. However, the way Mars and Apollo are portrayed in their sleep produces two decidedly different comic reactions. The sprawled, exposed sleeping Mars, with his own lance held by the baby satyrs, pointing at him, is an object to be ridiculed. The portrayal of sleeping Apollo is less negative. He sits more upright with what appears to be an instrument in his hand. He is depicted more like the dozing professor whose students have gone off to play.

Thus, sleep takes on a different meaning. The undignified position of Mars, the god of war, compounded with the connotations of strength, power, and chaos, portrays sleep as a weakening force that places one in a compromising position. On the other hand, in Sleeping Apollo, sleep appears not to take away strength or might, but reason. This is reinforced by the fact that Apollo is linked to reason and foresight. Sleep has removed him of rationality and made him completely oblivious to what has happened. This is further symbolized by the abandoning of the books and instruments of the Muses in front of him. Also, Apollo sits in the dark, enclosed by the trees; he is alone in the secluded realm of sleep and completely segregated from the outside world. Lack of rationality in sleep has become a key issue in the realm of forensic aspects of sleep, with recent media emphasis on the condition of sexsomnia and the consternation over the lack of mens rea in the sleeping state.

Giorgione’s Sleeping Venus (Fig. 1-4), instead of two figures, has one, the female figure, who is sleeping. As in the other two paintings, Venus lies in a pastoral setting; but unlike in Mars and Venus, she is alone, and she is the one who is sleeping and nude. The curves of her body emulate the undulating hills. She has her left hand covering her genitals. This is an extremely erotic picture.

Figure 1-4 Giorgione, Sleeping Venus, ca. 1508. Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden, Germany.

Sleep has taken on a different meaning here. Venus has become not someone to laugh at, like Mars or Apollo. Her strength or power or reason has not been taken away from her because of sleep. Rather, sexuality—which Venus is associated with—has become enhanced by sleep. According to Maria Ruvoldt, the conscious placement of her hand over her genitals refers to her procreative powers. Also, she has her right arm up to expose her armpit. This gesture is commonly associated with seduction in certain periods in Western art. Moreover, because the curves of her body imitate the landscape, there is a direct connection between her and nature, thus further associating her with fecundity.

Religion

Instead of classical mythology, many artists have turned to the Bible in their representations of sleep. In his oil painting Earthly Paradise (Fig. 1-5), Pierre Bonnard depicts a slumbering Eve and an alert Adam. Bonnard uses the same pictorial language in his rendering of Eve: the exposed armpit and her rounded form alluding to nature. Her rendering and sleeping posture make her look thanatotic.

Although the pairing of the two biblical characters reminds us of Botticelli’s Mars and Venus, they are not similar to the two mythical characters. By using the same visual language as Giorgione, Bonnard allows the female sleeper to be the empowered, natural being, as opposed to Botticelli’s weakened male protagonist. One could argue, as the Art Institute of Chicago does, that “the male, seen as essentially intellectual, is able to transcend the earthly.” However, one can interpret this as Eve being given more power because she was given more attention in terms of her physiognomy, rather than the awakened Adam. She is foreshortened and is positioned closest to the viewer. Furthermore, her color is in great contrast to the rest of the painting so that she becomes a focal point, and detail is given to her face. On the other hand, Adam is rendered in shadow and only his profile is shown. Although he is standing—which could insinuate evolution—he is colored like the rest, to the point where he looks like a tree, or is simian-like.

In works such as Piero della Francesca’s Dream of Constantine (Fig. 1-6), sleep is depicted as the state in which the divine communicates with humans. This is a common occurrence in mythology and religious stories. Well-known instances are the Bible’s Jacob and his dream of the ladder that reached heaven, as well as the Egyptian Pharaoh’s prophetic dreams that would be interpreted by Joseph. Whatever the story, it is necessary that the protagonist enter the state of sleep in order to hear God speak to him. In this early Renaissance painting, Constantine is shown reposed in a tent and is flanked by his sentinels. There is—or what appears to be—an angel swooping from the upper left corner as if to deliver a divine message from God. This image depicts the moment, Laurie Schneider Adams tells us, when Constantine’s dream “revealed the power of the Cross, and led to his legal sanction of Christianity.” As opposed to Botticelli’s Mars and Venus and Giorgione’s Sleeping Venus, Constantine is neither emasculated nor empowered with sexual prowess. Sleep is depicted as a state wherein only the divine becomes revealed and the sleeper can realize higher states of consciousness. This is further exemplified by the contrast between Constantine and his guards. The leader is composed and peaceful in his rest as though receptive to a divine message. (This may be thought of as a foreshadowing of current research that links sleep in a critical way with the consolidation of memory.) The soldiers, on the other hand, appear languid and unaware of the angel that is delivering the message. The artist uses both this event and sleep as a way to demonstrate the former and to explore the latter. It is interesting to note that the title and content of the painting force the viewer to ask whether he or she is witnessing an event that is occurring in reality, or are we privy to the actual dream of Constantine? Are we the awake sleepers who are also in Constantine’s higher state and are witnessing the delivery of this divine message?