Pentheus

The king who refused to see the god — and paid for it. Drawn large, drawn clearly.

Pentheus is a studio work by artist Neve, pencils and spray on MDF, 120 × 193 cm, created in 2017 for Galerie Bartoux.

"Pentheus" is a 2017 pencils and spray on MDF made for Galerie Bartoux, 120 × 193 cm — the second work in a series that includes "Selene ed Endimione" and "Fortuna e Psiche." The dimensions are proportioned to the golden ratio: 193/120 ≈ φ (1.618). Pentheus, king of Thebes, refused to honor Dionysus and forbade the Bacchic rites. In the myth, the god eventually destroys him through madness. But this is not that moment. This is the moment of resistance: the king stands, upright, refusing. Neve's Pentheus is bearded, shirtless, a mala necklace across his chest — a man entirely present in his body, holding his ground. Two women press in on either side: one reaches toward him with gesturing hands, the body inclined, the movement seductive; one draws close from the right, her hands on his arm, her face turned upward toward his. Below, a youth with a wreath of vine leaves — Dionysiac, Bacchic — looks up at the central figure. Bacchus and his instruments surround him. The hands touch, offer, insist. Pentheus looks above and beyond all of them. He does not yield. The composition is a converging motion — all bodies moving toward the center — and the center does not move. The resistance is in the posture: the one who is offered everything and does not take it, who is surrounded by ecstasy and remains himself. In the Bartoux series, each work takes the encounter between a human being and an overwhelming force from a different angle: Selene descends to the sleeper (desire arrives as a gift); Pentheus stands while the god's temptations close in (desire offered, refused); Fortuna reaches for a blindfolded Psyche (luck presses against the soul that fights back).