The Triumph of Galatea

The present painting depicts the Triumph of Galatea. According to both Homer and Hesiod, the sea nymph Galatea (meaning ‘she who is milk-white’)... more

by Artemisia Gentileschi

Title

The Triumph of Galatea

Artist

Artemisia Gentileschi

Medium

Painting - Oil On Canvas

Description

The present painting depicts the Triumph of Galatea. According to both Homer and Hesiod, the sea nymph Galatea (meaning ‘she who is milk-white’) was the fairest and most beloved of the Nereids, the fifty daughters of Nereus. In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Galatea appears as the beloved of the shepherd Acis. Their love inspired the jealous fury of another of her admirers, the cyclops Polyphemus. In a rage, Polyphemus killed his rival with a rock. Galatea then transformed his blood into the River Acis. During the Renaissance and Baroque periods, painters depicted various episodes from Ovid’s story, and poets and opera librettists explored this famous classical love triangle. The Triumph of Galatea also became a popular subject, thanks in large part to Raphael’s fresco in the Villa Farnesina in Rome, completed around 1514. The painting established the basic conventions for the depiction of the subject by subsequent Italian artists, showing Galatea, a nude figure encircled in a billowing cloak, riding atop a large shell pulled by dolphins and surrounded by nymphs and tritons frolicking upon the waves. The ultimate source for these depictions is a lost wall painting described in the third century by Philostratus the Elder in his Imagines:
‘The nymph sports on the peaceful sea, driving a team of four dolphins yoked together and working in harmony; and maiden-daughters of Triton, Galatea’s servants, guide them, curving them in if they try to do anything mischievous or contrary to the rein. She holds over her heads against the wind a light scarf of sea-purple to provide a shade for herself and a sail for her chariot, and from it a kind of radiance falls upon her forehead and her head, though no white more charming than the bloom on her cheek; her hair is not tossed by the breeze, for it is so moist that it is proof against the wind. And lo, her right elbow stands out and her white forearm is bent back, while she rests her fingers on her delicate shoulder, and her arms are gently rounded, and her breasts project, nor yet is beauty lacking in her thigh. Her foot, with the graceful part that ends in it, is painted as on the sea and it lightly touches the water as if it were the rudder guiding her chariot. Her eyes are wonderful, for they have a kind of distant look that travels as far as the sea extends.’ (quoted in A. Fairbanks, ed. and trans., Philostratus the Elder, Imagines, London, 1931, book 2, chapter 18.)

Uploaded

December 21st, 2022