The Isle of the dead – a painting by Arnold Böcklin I ARTE TRIPS – 360 VR

Böcklin’s mysterious Isle of the Dead is one of the most often reproduced paintings in the history of art. It fascinated Lenin and Hitler, Freud and Clémenceau, and inspired both Dali and Scorsese. The painting represents the final journey as described in Greek mythology, as the boatman Charon accompanies the dead to the underworld on the other side of the river Styx. This experience proposes something unthinkable: join Charon and travel to the very portal of the underworld. The journey starts in a comfortable, cosy, modern apartment. Suddenly the world around you starts to break up: walls and surfaces crack, crumble and fall into the dark waters of the end of time. In an inescapable forward motion propelled by the collapse of everything around us, we glide across the water, petrified, towards the Isle of the Dead. A hypnotic journey filled with lugubrious poetry and architectural visions from another age, set to the powerful symphonic poem of Rachmaninov.

 

Based on the painting – “The Isle of the Dead” – Arnold Böcklin

Directed by – Benjamin Nuel

Written by – Benjamin Nuel – Clémence Madeleine-Perdrillat

Music – Isle of the Dead Op 29 Sergei Rachmaninoff by Hawkes & Son

Coproduction – ARTE France – Les Produits Frais

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