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A woman in loose flowing robes plays a lyre beside the body of a deceased man

In a dim room with marble walls and columns, a bright light shines on two figures, a woman and a deceased man. At center, the woman sits on the edge of a bed, holding a lyre in one hand and plucking it with her other. Loosely dressed in white, pink, and red robes, she faces left, her eyes raised in a distraught expression as she leans toward the man. The man’s body lies partially covered by blankets, his back leaned against the raised end of the bed. His head tilts back, his eyes closed, and his right arm rests limply on a cushion beside him.

Gallery Text

At the center of this palatial setting, the muse of epic poetry sings and strums her lyre to honor Homer, the deceased, recumbent bard. Interest in the legend of Homer’s life and works reached an apogee during the French Revolution and continued to be a popular subject for neoclassical artists throughout the nineteenth century. This composition is inspired by Greek imagery honoring heroes, and the bas-relief in the background reproduces a scene from a section of the Parthenon frieze that entered the Musée du Louvre’s collection in 1798. The disposition of the figures recalls those in David’s 1783 painting Andromache Mourning Hector, which features an episode from the Trojan Wars that was narrated in many ancient texts, including Homer’s Iliad. That painting had earned David full membership in the French Academy, and its structure was often echoed in his students’ work.

Identification and Creation

Object Number
1943.231
People
Circle of Jacques-Louis David, French (Paris 1748 - 1825 Brussels)
Title
Calliope Mourning Homer
Other Titles
Alternate Title: Homer and Calliope
Classification
Paintings
Work Type
painting
Date
1812
Culture
French
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/230368

Location

Location
Level 2, Room 2220, European and American Art, 17th–19th century, Rococo and Neoclassicism in the Eighteenth Century
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Physical Descriptions

Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
84.5 x 100.7 cm (33 1/4 x 39 5/8 in.)
framed: 108.6 x 124.5 x 12.5 cm (42 3/4 x 49 x 4 15/16 in.)
Inscriptions and Marks
  • inscription: l.l., black oil, handwritten, signed: J. L. David 1812

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History
Ambrose Thomas. Marquis de la Coussay, Chateau de Septeuil, Seine et Oise, by descent; to Madame La Febvre-Contamine, his mother, by descent; to Madame Laffront-Ferrare. Sold, [via Martin Birnbaum, Paris]; to Grenville Lindall Winthrop, New York, 1935, bequest; to Fogg Art Museum, 1943

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Bequest of Grenville L. Winthrop
Accession Year
1943
Object Number
1943.231
Division
European and American Art
Contact
am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Publication History

  • Chinese Sculpture, Bronzes, Jades, Paintings and Drawings, Egyptian and Persian sculpture, Pre-Columbian art; selected from the collection of Grenville Lindall Winthrop, exh. cat., Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA, 1943), p. 3
  • Seymour Howard, "Boy on a Dolphin: Nollekens and Cavaceppi", The Art Bulletin, College Art Association of America (June 1964), Vol. 46, No. 2, pp. 177-189, p. 189
  • Edgar Peters Bowron, European Paintings Before 1900 in the Fogg Art Museum: A Summary Catalogue including Paintings in the Busch-Reisinger Museum, Harvard University Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 1990)
  • Philippe Bordes, Exhibition Review: Paris and Versailles David, The Burlington Magazine (February 1990), Vol. 132, No. 1043, p. 154
  • Stephan Wolohojian, ed., A Private Passion: 19th-Century Paintings and Drawings from the Grenville L. Winthrop Collection, Harvard University, exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Yale University Press (U.S.) (New York, 2003), p. 28, fig. 22
  • Stephan Wolohojian, Ingres, Burne-Jones, Whistler, Renoir... La Collection Grenville L. Winthrop, exh. cat., Musée des Beaux-Arts de Lyon and Réunion des Musées Nationaux (Paris, France, 2003), repr. in color p. 38 as fig. 21
  • Yuriko Jackall and Philippe Bordes, America Collects Eighteenth-Century French Painting, exh. cat., National Gallery of Art/Lund Humphries Publishers (Washington, DC, 2017), pp. 108-109, repr. p. 109 as fig. 6 [as Circle of Jean-Baptiste Regnault, "The Sleep of Anacreon(?), c. 1800]

Exhibition History

  • Chinese sculpture, bronzes, jades, paintings and drawings, Egyptian and Persian sculpture, Pre-Columbian art : selected from the collection of Grenville Lindall Winthrop, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 10/01/1943 - 02/28/1944
  • For Students of Art and Lovers of Beauty: Highlights from the Collection of Grenville L. Winthrop, Harvard University Art Museums, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 04/16/2004
  • Re-View: S422 Ancient & Byzantine Art & Numismatics, Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Cambridge, 04/12/2008 - 06/18/2011
  • 32Q: 2220 18th-19th Century, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, 11/16/2014 - 01/01/2050

Subjects and Contexts

  • Google Art Project

Related Works

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of European and American Art at am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu