This Painting Is So Disturbing. Here's Why.

This Painting Is So Disturbing. Here's Why. by @MadameValmain
Explore the hidden emotions and social dynamics in Berthold Woltze’s The Irritating Gentleman, a powerful 19th-century painting that still resonates today.
XOXO,
Madame Valmain
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The cigar is either a mistake or a rather clever little bit of storytelling. The lighted end of a cigar only glows either when the smoker is drawing on it, whenever a strong breeze or gust of air blows upon it, or the very instant that cigar ash is jettisoned from the tip. It looks so ‘fresh’ and free of greyed ash that, unless the older man has only just jumped up out of his seat to engage with the younger woman, the only other possible explanation for the cigar tip’s appearance is that a split-second prior to this ‘snapshot’ the older man allowed ash to fall from his cigar directly onto the seat next to the young woman or flicked it, whether consciously or otherwise. It’s in such a central position in the composition that it makes one wonder why it’s painted in this way and what, if anything, we are to infer from its appearance.
Respectable women of the time would never have smoked in public, gentlemen rarely smoked in the presence of a lady in a public place. In this context, that the older gentleman is merrily enjoying a cigar regardless of the social conventions of the day suggests that this is a man not unduly concerned with respecting societal norms or observing commonly-accepted standards of propriety: that he appears carelessly or intentionally to be allowing cigar ash - to say nothing of the smoke nor smell thereof - to encroach into a fellow passenger’s personal space indicates a boorish and borderline aggressive lack of due regard and respect for the young woman; presumably, he feels supremely confident that nobody - least of all the woman - is likely to challenge his behaviour; coupled with his leering gaze, which she appears too distressed and intimidated to meet, it only serves to highlight the man’s impudence and assumptions of superiority.
One hopes the young lady was approaching the end of her journey.