In Greek mythology associated with Cyparissus beloved by Apollo, and with Hades, god of the underworld. Symbol of Immortality, of life and death, of mourning …

3. In Greek mythology associated with Cyparissus beloved by Apollo, and with Hades, god of the underworld.
Symbol of Immortality, of life and death, of mourning …

4. The cypress tree
in European paintings

6. The last moments of the two brothers are staged in one of Angelico's most beautiful
landscapes...
Saints Cosmas and Damian were two famous doctors who cured people for free.
Accused of disturbing public order by spreading their Christian faith,
they were sentenced to atrocious torture before being beheaded.
...
Outside a town with fortifications akin to those of Jerusalem,
the two saints wait to join their three disciples Antimus, Leonzio and Eupreprius
and
a row of five cypresses symbolize the five executed.
Fra Angelico
Le Martyre des saints Cosme et Damien
The Beheading of Saints Cosmas and Damian
1438-1440
Musée du Louvre, Paris

8. Under the arches between the columns are the slender figures
of the Madonna and of the angel in devout converse ...
in the background, the celestial fields with tall Tuscan cypresses
Fra Angelico
Annunciation
L'Annonciation du couvent San Marco
1442-1443
Convento di San Marco, Florence

12. Evelyn’s belief that death is to be welcomed and not feared ...
The Angel of Death, grey hair and scythe, a beautiful and benign figure,
gently comforting a young woman.
Behind her a barren landscape, with three daisy flowers visible,
in contrast the way forward is illustrated with a fertile landscape and spring flowers,
demonstrating Evelyn's view that the path of the Angel of Death is not to be feared.
Either way, there will be the grief marked by the cypress trees …
Evelyn De Morgan
The Angel of Death
L'Ange de la Mort
1881
The De Morgan Centre, Guildford, Surrey

16. The Angel Gabriel, who arrives on uplifted wings and bended knees
to announce to Mary that she will be pregnant with Christ by God,
alights on a garden carpeted with flowers and plants.
Beyond the foreground is another seemingly out of place portion
of this setting – a mystical landscape
The three cypress behind Gabriel is vertically balanced
by the single cypress and quoins of the pietra serena
architecture behind Mary.
The cypress tree and the sarcophagus painted directly beneath it,
both symbols of death, are here to remind the viewer
of the end of life in the middle of a painting about the beginning of life.
"I am the beginning and the end," Christ said,
and here the alpha and omega are explicitly rendered.
Leonardo da Vinci
Annunciation
L'Annonciation
1472
Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence,,

21. Apollo laments Hyacinth, who he accidentally killed during a ball game ...
a semi-nude Hyacinth, visibly bruised on his cheek, but hardly in the throes of death,
lying on the ground looks up at the anguished Apollo;
the Cupid to the right also seems to have suffered some facial injury, perhaps in sympathy;
a motley group of witnesses, wearing the most extraordinary headgear and clothing;
some hyacinth flowers, the racquet and balls
the malicious smile the statue of Pan, which seems to have turned its head so as not to
miss the outcome of the story;
a brightly colored parrot, who seems to have escaped from another story ...
and
Tiepolo, who places cypresses in the background, alluding both to the earlier
story of Cyparissus and to Apollo's grief.
Giambattista Tiepolo
La Mort d'Hyacinthe
The Death of Hyacinth
1752-53
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

25. A young man stands next to the body of a stag which he has just shot with an arrow.
His hands are flung up in horror, and greenery is growing from his fingers
and from his head.
…
This is the story of Cyparissus, a favorite of Apollo, who has accidentally killed
his own pet stag (Ovid, Metamorphoses (X, 126ff.).
He was so distressed that he begged Apollo to be allowed to mourn forever, so Apollo
transformed him into a cypress tree, the symbol of mourning.
Domenichino, Le Dominiquin
The Transformation of Cyparissus
La métamorphose de Cyparisse
1616-1618
National Gallery, London

29. An avenue of cypress trees ...
A woman dressed in black, carries a classical lyre in her hand, indicating that she is a poet.
Only mortals related to the gods and other heroes could be admitted past the river Styx.
Later, the conception of who could enter was expanded to include those chosen by the
gods, the righteous, and the heroic. They would remain at the Elysian Fields after death,
to live a blessed and happy life, and indulge in whatever employment they had enjoyed
in life.
Carlos Schwabe
Champs Élysées
Elysian Fields
1903
Private collection

32. The hilly Tuscan countryside is dotted with ominous cypress trees,
frequently found along roadsides and near cemeteries ...
a sandy road,
long afternoon shadows
and
rows of olive and cypress trees
Giuseppe Abbati
Country Road with Cypresses
Route de campagne avec des cyprès
1860
Galleria dell'Arte Moderna, Palazzo Pitti, Florence

35. The blaze of the Midi ...
in the background the Hauts de Cagnes with the silhouette of the medieval castle
Henri-Edmond Cross
Les Cyprès à Cagnes
Cypresses at Cagnes
1908
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

38. Under the strong winter sun, stone and esplanade are adorned with deep
and clear-cut shadows ...
Pierre-Auguste Renoir
La Chapelle Notre-Dame de Protection au Haut-de-Cagnes
The Church of Notre-Dame de Protection at Haut-de-Cagnes
1905
Private collection

40. Towards the end of the First World War Modigliani travelled south to Nice
and Haut-de-Cagnes where, unusually, he produced a series of landscape paintings …
Amedeo Modigliani
Cyprès et maisons à Cagnes
Cypresses and Houses at Cagnes
1919
Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia and Merion

43. The rocky island protrudes monumentally from the calm sea,
the tops of the dark cypress trees, move slightly in the cloudy sky ...
A boat with a person wrapped in a white cloth standing
in front of a coffin is gliding towards the island.
…
The deceased being rowed across to the island, which calls on the classical myth
of Charon, who rows the dead over the rivers Styx and Acheron to the underworld.
Arnold Böcklin
Island of the Dead, fifth version
L'Île des morts, cinquième version
1886
Museum der Bildenden Künste, Leipzig

47. Mysterious and strange cypress trees shaken by the wind,
a dark, ruined building,
banks of cloud in a dramatic light,
the sun’s rays break through,
and
a large flock of crows are arriving to perch on the top of the walls
Arnold Böcklin
Ruin by the Sea
Ruine au bord de la mer
1881
Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland

49. Van Gogh's starry sky,
a peaceful village,
and
a cypress connecting earth and sky
... a tree traditionally associated with cemeteries and death.
Van Gogh wrote in one of his letters “We take death to go to a star.”
In this painting, it could be the connection between life (which happens on earth)
and death (which is when you go to the stars according to Van Gogh).
Vincent van Gogh
The Starry Night
La Nuit étoilée
1889
Museum of Modern Art , Manhattan, New York City

53. On 25 June 1889, Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo:
‘The cypresses still preoccupy me ... It’s beautiful as regards lines
and proportions like an Egyptian obelisk. And the green has
such a distinguished quality. It’s the dark patch in a sun-drenched landscape.’
Devoid of visible human presence, this landscape includes typically
Provençal motifs –
the blue Alpilles mountains,
a golden wheat field,
an olive bush
and
tall evergreen cypresses.
Vincent van Gogh
Champ de blé avec cyprès
Wheat Field with Cypresses
juin 1889
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY

56. A last memory of Saint-Rémy ...
a night sky with a moon without brightness,
a star with exaggerated brightness in the ultramarine sky,
a road bordered by tall yellow canes,
a yellow carriage harnessed to a white horse,
and
two late walkers
and
a very tall cypress, very straight, very dark.
(Vincent wrote to Gauguin, ‘I still have a cypress with a star from down there.
It’s a final attempt…very romantic, if you like, but very Provençal, I think.’)
Vincent van Gogh
Route avec un cyprès et une étoile
Road with Cypress and Star
May 1890, Auvers-sur-Oise
Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo

59. An enigmatic work …
A petrified horse rises above a blue sky filled with clouds and storms
…
Inspired by Bröcklin's paintings, with his fabulous creatures immersed
in an atmosphere charged with mystery.
Could also be interpreted as an updated version of the mythological paintings depicting
Pegasus, the winged steed often depicted in the company of Perseus and Andromeda.
Or Dalí's own version of Greek myth.
Salvador Dalí
Ossification matinale du cyprès
Morning Ossification of Cypress Tree
1934
Collection privée

62. A beautiful and mysterious painting,
a landscape, between the real and the imaginary,
the "enigmatic elements" beneath a sky notable for its special, intense light …
In the foreground Delft’s Vermeer sitting in front of the easel, painting a surrealistic
landscape of ochre and greenish tones, like those in his View of Delft
Dalí as a boy, dressed as a sailor, holding a hoop and a bone, and beside him, sitting,
the figure of a nursemaid engaged in some unspecific task.
A tower, a bell tower typical of Catalan churches.
a silhouette, inexplicably and equivocally draped
and
five cypress trees,
an allusion to one of the Surrealists' favorite painters, Arnold Böcklin.
Salvador Dalí
Eléments énigmatiques dans un paysage
Enigmatic Elements in a Landscape
1934
Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí, Figueres

65. o.esqsegues@gmail.com
The cypress tree in European paintings
Le cyprès dans la peinture européenne
images and text credit www.
Music Peter Mclsaac , Feather
created olga.e.
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