Thetis

Michael Bodholt

A mother trying to save her son from a tragic destiny is something any mother would take the opportunity to do, and when I look at the thesis “dipping achilles into the river” artwork I see that and so much more. I also see a remark towards our current society through the artwork as well. Thomas Banks' masterpiece is not only a beautiful piece of sculpture but goes far deeper than that in my eyes.

        The sculpture was made with a soft white Sicilian marble which is easy on the eyes to fall into the heavenly details within the work. It shows a mother(Thetis) dipping her son(Achilles) into the river Styx to make him invulnerable to all parts of the body minus the heel she was holding that did not reach the water.

        I believe the painting reaches to our society in such a variety of ways. Achilles was invulnerable to everywhere but his heel, and that’s how I feel a lot of people show themselves to the outside world. Anyone who’s had the pleasure of experiencing highschool or seen a highschool related movie knows there's always the one huge jock who comes off as tough, rowdy, and most commonly known as an asshole. We see that in a lot of these movies the “bully” always has some underlying thing that makes the audience feel empathy for the bully. Someone who’s all high and mighty like Achilles is actually pretty common in our society, and like Achilles they both share having that heel of weakness. It makes me ponder on how we all have our moments where we feel on top of the world and invulnerable, but everyone will always have that “heel” that they carry with them throughout their life no matter how invincible they feel. When I look at Thomas bank’s artwork of Thetis and Achilles, some people may say they see details or purity within the marble, but the one thing that I see is unity. I see unity for everyone that goes through life with the confidence of Achilles. Fighting and conquering life as if it were the trojans in the war. But the term achilles now carries a lot of weight, one of the terms meaning weakness. Achilles’s story may show is confidence from being invulnerable, but when you look at the artwork it shows you directly that it was never the confidence of being invulnerable that made him such a good fighter, it was the irony of being cacious for not letting his heal be struck similar. A lot of society doesn’t succeed in life because of their confidence but from their heel fear of not achieving goals, or not living the life they desire.