Hamlet, Art, and Apoptosis: The Shakespearean Artwork of Julie Newdoll

Contemporary artist Julie Newdoll’s painted series “Shakespeare: The Mirror up to Science” explores the connection between Shakespeare’s Hamlet, suicide, and science. Using the thesis supported by the work of Burton R. Pollin that Hamlet’s revenge is fueled by his desire to commit suicide, Newdoll shows how the biological process of apoptosis—that is, programmed cell death—can be used as a metaphor for Hamlet’s suicide narrative through her paintings.