Gericault depicts a scene wherein people are forced to choose their own fate, with to hold onto hope or surrender to the miseries that besiege them. In his painting we find a rescue ship barely visible to the naked eye, so distant that it goes almost unnoticeable to the average onlooker. To those art lovers who do indeed notice, the ship appears to be sailing away from the raft rather than toward it. The overall image shows the raft in the midst of a broad ocean with two dark, looming waves on the verge of swallowing it. The implication is that there is no realistic reason to hope for survival. It is in the moment that one is lost at sea facing neglect and desertion that he is forced to recognize truth, either choosing to accept it or lose all meaning in his own existence.

The triangle of hope depicted…