This mural design for the Festival of Britain repurposes the myth of Theseus to reflect the self-identity of 1950s Britain.

Theseus' narrow rectangular shape resembles a classical pediment, whose sculptures often told important stories. The full moon on the left and the half moon on the right establish a passing of time in a dark setting. The left-hand side represents the 'old age'. The Minotaur, an embodiment of savageness, is killed by the central figure Theseus, as shown by the bull skull. The figures on the left are frightened of his light, which represents British exploration and enterprise.

On the right, the 'new age' is illuminated by the light. The figures have just disembarked and are intrigued by the unchartered lands.

During World War 2, Henry Moore turned his hand to drawing due to a shortage of sculptural materials. In 1944 he illustrated a print version of Edward Sackville-West's radio play, The Rescue. It re-tells the ending of Homer's Odyssey, in which Odysseus kills the suitors waiting at his palace to marry his wife Penelope.

The bodies, sprawled in a sea of blood, resemble Moore's sculpture. The range of poses suggests they are in different stages of dying, thereby emphasising the agony. They could even be compared to the Pompeiian plaster casts. But their scattered weapons remind us not to feel pity.

The unwelcome presence of the suitors is a commentary on the Nazis, who were occupying Odysseus' native Greece when the play was written.

This Chagall lithograph takes from Julnar the Sea-Born, a story in the Arabian Nights. Julnar is a slave-girl whose beauty infatuates men. She comes from a mermaid family but escaped after falling out with her brother. This plate depicts the moment she beached herself so she could be rescued by a human: 'So I came forth of the Sea and sat down on the edge of an island in the moonshine...'

Chagall does not focus on narrative here; he is more intent on capturing Julnar's beauty. He puts her in the foreground to give her priority. The moonshine in the top left ripples across the water, illuminating her. Unlike the small obscure figures behind her, she is symmetrical and defined, and her body curves echo the movement of the waves.

Wyndham Lewis was a famous 20th-century radical who pioneered Vorticism. This short-lived art movement challenged traditional art with its strong geometric angles and abstraction.

In The Centauress I, Lewis turns a traditionally male mythological creature into a female. She seems immobilised by the modern abstract shapes surrounding her. Her startled expression could represent the old order's fear of the future.

Lewis used centauresses in his murals for a London nightclub called The Cave of the Golden Calf. In the Bible the Golden Calf is a false idol — a rejection of God's authority. Although this space only existed between 1912 and 1914, it was greatly enjoyed by Lewis and his radical friends.