This piece is painted on double primed Belgian linen mounted on portrait panel and is professionally framed.

Beret is a character from one of my favorite books Giants in the Earth by O.E. Rovlaag. In the book Beret is a young girl who displays symptoms of prairie madness. She feels guilty for leaving her parents in Norway, and is frightened by life on the Plains. Many early settlers of the Great Plains and the Tallgrass prairie experienced what they termed “prairie madness”. Much like cabin fever, it was a mental breakdown caused by the harsh living conditions and the extreme levels of isolation on the prairie. Symptoms of prairie madness included: depression, withdrawal and changes in character that sometimes resulted in the afflicted person moving back East or, in extreme cases, suicide.

The idea of four temperaments comes from the Ancient Greeks. They held that there were four fundamental personality types: Sanguine, Choleric, Phlegmatic and Melancholic. The melancholic temperament is traditionally associated with the element of earth and it is thought that people with this temperament appear: serious, introverted, cautious or even suspicious.

Today, melancholy is associated with a short-term gloomy state of mind or sober thoughtfulness.