Every person who enters the world of art forgets the real world. The goal of art is beauty, while the method of creating said beauty is the imitation of nature, as Alberti would have said. Fascinated with the illusionist image of the world reflected in the water, he desires to capture it, keep it forever, and immortalize it.
Therefore, the topic of the work would not be a story of egoistical love, but the art that Narcissus discovers. However, is the person in front of us a mythological figure, or did the creator of the painting used the book La Pittura (1435), in which, its author, an architect, and a theoretician of art of the Renaissance, Leon Battista Alberti names Narcissus as the inventor of painting? Does not (art) painting strive to encompass every element of our life? – asks Alberti. The topic of Narcissus at the source was a subject that was often undertaken by artists of the early Baroque, Giovanni Battista Marino, a well-known poet of the time, devoted one of his poems to him. The figure of Narcissus emerges out of this gloom, thanks to a sharp light placed on the left, which exposes the body and clothing of the youth. In it, we do not notice the silhouettes of the trees and forest described in the myth, while the water of the stream seems to be no more than a dirty puddle. The painting is bereft of any context, dark, almost monochromatic, with a dominance of bronzes, intersected with dirty white, lead-silver, and celadon. The composition of the work is cramped, it is closed off in a circle, while the figure of the main hero occupies almost the entire canvas, building a truly claustrophobic space. The love which Narcissus seeks is only an illusion, and he becomes its prisoner. The punishment of the divine Nemesis is not for unreturned love but rather for the poignant feeling of emptiness, where there is no room for love. He flees from "normal" love out of fear of responsibility, criticism, and shame. However, does the Narcissus shown in the painting freeze in admiration of himself, or does he perhaps see a reflection of someone completely unknown to him and falls in love with a stranger? Perhaps our hero is a self-conscious, extremely sensitive youth, who avoids contact with others due to an all-consuming doubt and low self-esteem. As a result, Narcissus has become a symbol of egoism and egotism, a person, who does not show empathy towards others and cannot show feelings towards others, does not care about others and expects unconditional devotion. In psychology his figure is connected with the phenomenon of narcissism – a character trait focused on the desire to appeal to others and arouse admiration. In the painting, we can see him shortly before his death, infatuated with himself, hypnotized by the illusion, and in love with an image without a body.
In accordance with the prophecy of Tiresias, in order to survive the boy had to reject love of himself and the delight at seeing his own image and needed to learn to love others. This angered the goddess of just retribution and fate, Nemesis, who as punishment sent Narcissus to a source, in which he saw his reflection. The youth rejected the love of the nymph Echo, who with a broken heart retreated to a cave and the only thing that was left behind was a voice repeating the words of others. “The seer (Tiresias) asked whether, Narcissus would live a long life, to a ripe old age, replied, if he does not discover himself”. That is how in a myth about Narcissus (Metamorphoses III) Ovid tells us the story of a boy whose future is uncertain.
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