THE LAST PHARAOH
My latest painting: THE LAST PHARAOH
The Last Pharaoh, The Great Egyptian Empress, Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator, was more than the sum of the seductions that loom so large in history—and in Hollywood.
Cleopatra ruled Egypt for 21 years a generation before the birth of Christ. She lost her kingdom once; regained it; nearly lost it again; amassed an empire; lost it all. A goddess as a child, a queen at 18, at the height of her power she controlled virtually the entire eastern Mediterranean coast, the last great kingdom of any Egyptian ruler. For a fleeting moment, she held the fate of the Western world in her hands. She had a child with a married man, three more with another. A capable, clear-eyed sovereign, she knew how to build a fleet, suppress an insurrection, control a currency. Catastrophe reliably cements a reputation, and Cleopatra's end was sudden and sensational. She died at 39.
If the name is indelible, the image is blurry. She may be one of the most recognizable figures in history, but one has little idea what Cleopatra actually looked like. Coin-portraits of Cleopatra show a countenance alive rather than beautiful, with a sensitive mouth, firm chin, liquid eyes, broad forehead, and prominent nose. Cleopatra wanted to reach out to her Egyptian subjects as the Pharaoh, for which she sought to depict herself as the reincarnation of goddess Isis, and thus wore a cobra and styled herself as the new Isis. She alone of her line took the trouble to learn Egyptian.
Few women of antiquity have gripped the public imagination as Cleopatra has. For centuries, she has inspired playwrights, poets, artists, and filmmakers, with the result that she and Antony are arguably history's most famous lovers. Thanks to Hollywood and Shakespeare, Cleopatra seems more of a myth to the present generation.
Such an elusive figure inspires questions: Is she really the seductive queen who ended her empire for a man? Or is she someone who got lost in history? Now, when centuries separate us from her, when we see her amazing face in coins and paintings, a strange unexplainable feeling sweeps over us. Although the story of Cleopatra is one that has been told many times, there is a lot of things left we don't know about her. She still remains an enigma to everyone.
What was the mystery of her charisma? Who was Cleopatra twenty centuries ago and who is she now?
