The Kiss of the Divine
A visual exploration of the ‘supernatural husband/wife’ trope in fairytale, art and fashion
The Supernatural wife/husband trope can be found in hundreds of myths, fairytales and folklore legends across the world, some dating back centuries. Stories of magical lovers whose divine dispositions restrict their mortal desires, continue to inspire modern storytellers whose contemporary re-imaginings breathe with the sentience of these enduring tales.
The characters of these stories are often born from liminal settings, their romance sparking at a point where the veil between reality and the divine is at its thinnest. Part of the timelessness of this trope is the appeal of a love that transcends physical binaries, a commitment that is upheld through conflicting realms.
Tales that feature a supernatural lover symbolise larger themes of otherness, a crisis of identity or a desire to change, a subversion of the expectations of women, and the crossing of supernatural thresholds during intimate unions. While the sublimity of a supernatural love often makes for a joyful narrative, this trope is threaded with beads of loneliness, judgement, fear and isolation that bind each tale together. Each romance extends a question of true love in the face of unconventionality: where do the limits of love lie?
