Problem picture
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A problem picture is a genre of art popular in late Victorian painting, characterised by the deliberately ambiguous depiction of a key moment in a narrative that can be interpreted in several differen
Defendant and Counsel (1895), by William Frederick Yeames, a problem picture which invites the viewer to speculate on the woman's alleged crime and on whether or not she may be guilty.
The Camden Town Murder by Walter Sickert, 1908, originally titled, What Shall We Do for the Rent? or What Shall We Do to Pay the Rent
Problem play
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The problem play is a form of drama that emerged during the 19th century as part of the wider movement of realism in the arts, especially following the innovations of Henrik Ibsen. It deals with conte
Problem picture
…of a key moment in a narrative that can be interpreted in several different ways, or which portrays an unresolved dilemma. It has some relation to the problem play. The viewer of the picture is invited to speculate about several different possible explanations of the scene. The genre has much in common with that…
Scenes from a 1918 production of Mrs Warren's Profession by Bernard Shaw, an archetypal 'problem play'
A performance of Ibsen's Ghosts, one of the defining problem plays, in Berlin, 1983