Arnold Böcklin

Arnold Böcklin was born in Basel on 16 October 1827 and worked within the Symbolist current that turned away from realism toward myth and mood. Between 1880 and 1886 he painted five versions of Isle of the Dead, each showing a white-robed figure ferried toward a rocky island dense with cypresses. The image became an obsession for late Romantic composers, who borrowed its atmosphere for tone poems and orchestral works. Böcklin died on 16 January 1901, but the island kept drifting through European culture long after.