Illustration for Tales From Shakespeare 1923

This is Artuš Scheiner's illustration for Tales From Shakespeare, and it presents a crucial scene from Othello. Scheiner, a Czech artist, made this image at a time of burgeoning nationalist sentiment across Europe. Czechs were eager to celebrate their own unique cultural heritage and artistic traditions, while also engaging with international art and literature. Here, we see this interplay in action. The image places a Moorish Othello alongside a distinctly European Desdemona, in a scene that is both intimate and fraught with tension. Othello parts the curtains, revealing his wife in bed; she looks up at him, vulnerable and afraid. The composition highlights themes of race, gender, and power that Shakespeare's play explores so powerfully. Othello is a dark figure, an outsider, a barbarian, with an animalistic nature which serves to accentuate Desdemona's innocence. To delve deeper, one might consult theater history, postcolonial studies, or studies in gender and representation. Only by considering the historical and cultural context of its production and reception can we begin to understand the meaning and significance of this image.