Sick Girls and Sick Titles: Titles and Their Relationship to the Mode of Representation

The paper examines two paintings of sick girls by the Danish painters Michael Ancher and Ejnar Nielsen and asks the question whether it makes sense at all to discuss certain diseases when none of the artists diagnosed their paintings of sick or convalescent girls with a certain disease? Though these paintings of sick girls differ in the way they are composed, the titles of the works vary very little, the greatest difference often being whether the painting is titled The Sick Girl or The Convalescent. But does the title of the work affect the viewers’ perception of it, and does the title always make sense when you then look at the painting? Does the mode of representation of the sick girl have any influence on the title or vice versa? These are the questions that the paper tries to answer.