The expressions of conscience

Does conscience have expressions? If so, how would they look? Nineteenth-century British painter William Holman Hunt had excellent skills in expressing emotions. He is most well-known for his work “The Awakening Conscience,” which visualized the abstract concept of conscience.

The painting depicts a couple in a middle-class during the Victorian Age. Did the man just say the wrong thing? The woman is standing up from his lap. On the surface, it may look like a husband and a wife in a loving relationship but having a temporary discord. However, various symbols in the painting signal that the two are having an affair. Unlike the man in a blue suit, the woman is wearing a white dressing gown, which is equivalent to underwear. While the woman has three rings on her left hand, she doesn’t have a wedding ring, which means the man is visiting his mistress’s house. While the woman’s house, which must have been paid for by the man, is decorated with a piano and luxurious furniture, it is disorganized and clustered. An unfinished tapestry hung by the piano and yarn left on the floor hints at irresponsibility and unfaithfulness. A piece of paper written with “Tears, Idle Tears,” a poem by Alfred Tennyson, is left on the left corner of the floor. It is a poem regretting for the days that are gone. The mirror on the back shows that the woman is staring at a garden out the window.

The dead conscience is revived when hit by something. What woke her conscience was the radiant light of the spring. She must have been awakened by the bright light, which contrasts with the dark and messy room. Did she decide to change her life? She is standing up, away from the man. However, the woman’s facial expression‎ is unclear. It was originally painted to show her painful emotions, but the customer who purchased the painting asked the painter to change it, which led to such an ambiguous expression‎.

Perhaps, the real expression‎ of conscience looks like that. It must have moments of joy, pain, and shame, like the expression‎ of the woman that is not joyful nor sad but complex.