The Goldfinch—a famous Dutch painting—represents the transcendent power of art and beauty, but also its fragility. Both Audrey and—as readers learn toward the end of the novel—Welty have a special attachment to the painting, which is the only surviving work by the Dutch master Carel Fabritius. Fabritius was a famous and important painter in his time, but almost all of his works were destroyed in an explosion that also killed him in 1654. The Goldfinch, which was painted in the same year he died, is one of very few surviving works, which makes it crucially important to art history. The painting represents the miraculous survival (and, to use Theo’s word, “immortality”) of artwork across time. In the novel, the painting survives not just one but two explosions: the gunpowder factory explosion of 1654, and the terrorist attack that occurs at the Met. These two explosions show how art is constantly exposed to the risk of being destroyed.
After the terrorist attack, Welty tells Theo to take The Goldfinch, although his reasoning for doing so is never fully explained. When Theo does so, his ownership of the painting is a secret that comes to define his life. Initially, Theo is not particularly blameworthy for taking the painting. While technically a major crime, at only 13—and in the midst of a traumatic event that kills his mother—Theo could hardly be truly held responsible for taking The Goldfinch (particularly because he was following the instructions of a dying man in doing so). Yet rather than admitting to this act, Theo keeps it a secret, and as time passes the crime becomes more and more serious. This reaches an especially dramatic climax when it turns out that Boris stole the painting and used it as collateral within the criminal underworld. At this point, The Goldfinch represents not only secrecy, crime, and immorality, but also the way that art can be valued for all the wrong reasons. While being used as collateral, The Goldfinch is little more than an abstract promise of wealth and security. No one actually cares about it as an artwork.
When The Goldfinch and other artworks are recovered by the art crimes police and restored to public ownership, the painting once again comes to represent the value and importance of beautiful objects. By the end of the book, it certainly seems as if Theo was meant to steal The Goldfinch, because this act not only defines who he is, but leads to the redemptive happy ending of the novel, in the form of the discovery of many other stolen works of art.
The Goldfinch Quotes in The Goldfinch
It would be much easier to explain to Hobie how I had happened to take the painting out of the museum in the first place. That it was a mistake, sort of. That I’d been following Welty’s instructions; that I’d had a concussion. That I hadn’t fully considered what I was doing. That I hadn’t meant to let it sit around so long. Yet in my homeless limbo, it seemed insane to step up and admit to what I knew a lot of people were going to view as very serious wrongdoing.
One commentator, in London, had mentioned my painting in the same breath with the recovered Rembrandt:… has drawn attention to more valuable works still missing, most particularly Carel Fabritius’s Goldfinch of 1654, unique in the annals of art and therefore priceless…
I did know. Because if possible to paint fakes that look like that? Las Vegas would be the most beautiful city in the history of earth! Anyway—so funny! Here I am, so proudly teaching you to steal apples and candy from the magazine, while you have stolen world masterpiece of art.
Because this is closed circle, you understand? Horst is right on the money about that. No one is going to buy this painting. Impossible to sell. But—black market, barter currency? Can be traded back and forth forever! Valuable, portable. Hotel rooms—going back and forth. Drugs, arms, girls, cash—whatever you like.
Because—they are saying, ‘one of great art recoveries of history.’ And this is the part I hoped would please you—maybe not who knows, but I hoped. Museum masterworks, returned to public ownership! Stewardship of cultural treasure! Great joy! All the angels are singing! But it would never have happened, if not for you.
Insofar as it is immortal (and it is) I have a small, bright, immutable part in the immortality. It exists; and it keeps on existing. And I add my own love to the history of people who have loved beautiful things, and looked out for them, and pulled them from the fire, and sought them when they were lost, and tried to preserve them and save them while passing them along literally from hand to hand, singing out brilliantly from the wreck of time to the next generation of lovers, and the next.
The Goldfinch Symbol Timeline in The Goldfinch
