Blog: Asleep on the compost heap

A famous painting by the Swiss symbolist Arnold Böcklin depicts somewhere called the Isle of the Dead. At the turn of the 20th century people (particularly Germans) were apparently obsessed with this dark riddle of an image and prints of it used to hang off walls in houses in that part of Europe. As much as it fascinates me, I really can't understand why someone would casually hang this freaky shit over their mantelpiece. "So eh, nice new flooring you got put in there Friedrich - but what about that picture, the one beside the cuckoo clock?" "Ahh that [...]