Rosso Fiorentino (1495-1540) La sfida delle Pieridi (The Challenge of the Pierides) c.1523–1527 Oil on wood transferred to canvas, 31 x 63 cm Musée du Louvre, Paris A rare mythological subject This small painting represents an episode reported by Ovid in…
David, Jacques-Louis (1748-1825) Sapho, Phaon et l’Amour (Sappho, Phaon and Cupid) 1809 Oil on canvas, 225.3 x 262 cm Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg David is considered the founder and leading light of Neoclassicism, which dominated art in the late 18th and…
Mantegna, Andrea (c.1431-1506) San Sebastiano (Saint Sebastian) 4th quarter of the 15th century Tempera on canvas, 255 x 140 cm Musée du Louvre, Paris Composition surrounded by a trompe-l’oeil porphyry border. Probably arrived in Aigueperse (Auvergne) on the occasion of the marriage…
Poussin, Nicolas (1594-1665) Bacchanale (Bacchanal) 1625–1626 Oil on canvas, 122 x 169 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid This is a traditional scene from the iconography of Bacchus, the Roman god of wine. It depicts his meeting with Ariadne on the island…
Géricault, Théodore (1791-1824) Diane (Diana) Early 19th century Wash, pen on paper, 17.3 x 12 cm Museo del Prado, Madrid The composition is almost identical, with the same dimensions, to a Venus disarming Cupid (New York, Sotheby’s, January 28, 2015, n.…
Parmigianino (1503-1540) Cupido che fabbrica l’arco (Cupid Making His Bow) 1534–1539 Oil on lime, 135.5 × 65 cm Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
Gentileschi, Orazio (1563-1639) Danae e la pioggia d’oro (Danae and the Shower of Gold) 1621–1623 Oil on canvas, 161.5 × 227.1 cm Getty Center, Los Angeles This painting is part of a series of works executed by Gentileschi in 1622 for…
Gentileschi, Orazio (1563-1639) Danae c.1623 Oil on canvas, 162 x 228.5 cm Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland The gauzy scarf draped over Danaë was a studio prop present in many of Orazio‘s paintings. Danaë’s father feared a prophecy that his grandson…
David, Jacques-Louis (1748-1825) Cupidon et Psyché (Cupid and Psyche) 1817 Oil on canvas, 184.2 x 241.6 cm Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland Jacques-Louis David included two butterflies in this painting: one above the slumbering Psyche and the other on the base…
Guercino (1591-1666) Venere, Marte e Amore (Venus, Mars and Cupid) 1633 Oil on canvas, 139 x 161 cm Galleria Estense, Modena Following the indication of Venus, whose right hand is painted almost in a trompe l’oeil, Cupid is about to…