Chaos

Watts's 'Chaos' is an undated canvas held by the Fitzwilliam Museum that belongs to the most ambitious and philosophically extreme end of his allegorical programme. The concept of primordial chaos — the formless void from which creation emerges in both ancient mythology and modern cosmological thought — pushed Watts's figure-based allegory toward abstraction. Where most of his allegorical subjects could be embodied in a human figure, chaos required a visual language that could suggest the dissolution of form itself while still remaining a painting rather than pure abstraction. The Fitzwilliam's canvas documents Watts's willingness to push his practice to its limits in pursuit of metaphysical subject matter that defied easy pictorial resolution. The subject also connected with contemporary scientific debates about cosmological origins that fascinated Victorian thinkers across fields.

The oil on canvas employs an unusually turbulent and dissolved treatment compared to Watts's more classically composed allegorical figure paintings. Forms — whether figures, clouds, or cosmic bodies — are allowed to merge into and emerge from surrounding atmosphere, creating a visual analogue for the pre-formal state the subject demands. Colour is used atmospherically rather than descriptively.