About An Awakening Mind:

One of the artist, Damon Denys’, largest figurative realist paintings to date, An Awakening Mind is a faithful continuation of the Classical Realist style of the Victorian English painters of the late 1800’s. Painted with a high degree of detail for a grand scale figure painting, An Awakening Mind recalls the work of famous classical realists such as Frederick Lord Leighton and Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema.

The scene itself portrays a young woman, engaged in reading Aristotle’s Analytics in their original Greek language, who has had an epiphany of sorts and is now experiencing an elevation of mind and soul. Thus the name of the painting, An Awakening Mind. It is no coincidence that the figure is a woman, as the artist intended the picture to possess pro-feminine content that is relevant to modern times. The landscape behind her is agricultural, symbolizing the fertility of her mind. The farmland progresses towards a mountain, which we can see is very high indeed due to the presence of snow on its slopes (another symbol of the purity of the woman’s mind). The mountain peaks just behind the woman herself, symbolizing again her reaching an elevated state of mind. Her golden sash indicates the integrity and truth of her achievement, while the vivid red drapery underscores her passion and determination.

An Awakening Mind was modeled in the artist’s home town, Salt Lake City, Utah. The model is a good friend of the artist, and endured posing out doors for the composition. A determined visitor to Salt Lake City’s beautiful Red Butte Gardens may be lucky enough to discover the rock against which she reclines, as it is a faithful representation of the original and marks the exact location where the painting was staged.

An Awakening Mind has been featured on the covers of The Catalyst and The New Intellectual, appeared in a feature on the artist in Listen Magazine, and has been seen in Art And Antiques magazine as well.