An Antique Orison

Arthur B. Davies's "An Antique Orison" (c. 1914) is an oil on canvas that evokes the world of classical antiquity. The title refers to an orison—a prayer or supplication—of ancient times. Davies was deeply drawn to the classical past, not as a source of archaeological accuracy but as a repository of mythic and poetic meaning. This painting shows figures in a classical landscape—perhaps a Greek temple or sacred grove—engaged in a ritual of prayer. The figures are rendered in Davies's characteristic elongated style, their movements graceful and deliberate as if in a dream. The landscape glows with a golden, timeless light, suggesting the ideal world of classical Arcadia. Davies's classicism was filtered through the lens of Symbolism: his ancient world is not the historical Greece of the archaeologists but the imagined Greece of poets and artists, a place of eternal beauty and spiritual significance. This painting belongs to the period when Davies was at the height of his powers and his influence, just before the Armory Show of 1913 transformed the American art world.

Davies's classical idylls offered American audiences a vision of timeless beauty and spiritual harmony that provided an alternative to both academic realism and avant-garde radicalism.

This painting transports the viewer to an imagined antiquity where prayer and beauty are one, the golden landscape and graceful figures creating a vision of the classical world as a place of spiritual grace.