"Pygmalion and Galatea - Ernest Normand (1886)"
In ancient Greece, on the island of Cyprus, there lived a talented sculptor, named Pygmalion. He was so talented that his works, which were carved with beautiful ivory statues, were enough to seem real. Although he loved his work so much, he was not happy because he was so lonely. However, he didn’t want to get a wife because of the ruts of women in that period and he had no hope for to be love or loved by a woman so that he decided to make a statue “which” is the woman of his dreams. He had made and was charmed by the statue because it looked so alive. He kissed it and imagined that it kissed him back. He bought fancy gifts for it, dressed it with lots of glamorous jewels, and also laid with it and "called for it his bedfellow". So, he really fell in love with the statue.
When the Festival of Venus time came, he prayed the gods saying that ‘’If you gods can give all things, may I have as my wife, I pray’’ and continued ‘’one like the ivory maid’’. Noone but Venus understood his offer and she, goddess of love and beauty had turned Pygmalion’s statue to a real human being, to a woman, before he arrived at his home. When he arrived, he as always kissed his lover and realized that now his dreams about his statue came true. After that point, with Pygmalion's and Galatea’s great love, Venus married off them. As a gift, they had a child named Paphos, from whom the island took its name.
The artist, Ernest Normand, had chosen the realization point of transformation of Galatea in his painting because it is the highest point in the story that gives us the understanding of the power of love. There are two basic similarities and two evident differences between the story and the painting. As a first similarity, the artist reflects the beauty of ‘Galatea’ just as Venus’s beauty because, in the story, we learn that the statue was extremely beautiful and if so, it must be like Venus (the goddess of beauty), with its perfect physical appearance.
Secondly, in the story, Pygmalion dressed only its limbs in robes and it is the same as we see in the painting. On the other hand, as the evident differences, we can say that is the realization of the transformation of Galatea and her place in the painting. Pygmalion realizes her transformation when he kisses her and "feels the warmth of her lips" in the story. However, we see that he sees its transformation with only looking and his shocking appearance when he sees her anthropoid head, vibrant and blonde hairs, blue eyes. The important point is that there is no information about Galatea's blondness in the story.
Another different thing is that Pygmalion had put her to bed, even he called it his bedfellow before the transformation of the statue. Yet, Galatea stands at a table in the painting. As a result, although there are explicit differences, Ernest Normand pictures or externalizes it in a very good way because when we see it, we understand at the very first sight that is the love story before "bed" which is named “Pygmalion and Galatea” and it is the most important point of that story on it.
You can see a few painting examples now;
Jean-Léon Gérôme Pygmalion and Galatea, 1890
