Modern Art and Mythology
Works by Ingres, Serov, Klimt, Henrietta Rae and Elaine de Kooning
© Meg Nola
May 10, 2009
The gods, goddesses, nymphs, satyrs, monsters and mortals of Greek and Roman mythology were once near-compulsory subjects for artists, with many versions created through the years. Such themes became less common as art took on more personal significance and as classical training gave way to newer methods, but certain 19th- and even later 20th century mythological depictions offer a distinct perspective on some very time-tested tales.
Zeus and Jupiter
Greek Zeus had a counterpart named Jupiter in Roman mythology. Master of the thunderbolt, Zeus presided over Mount Olympus and attempted to keep all the other gods and his fiery wife Hera in line.
While French Neoclassic painter Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres took pride in maintaining academic standards, his 1811 Jupiter and Thetis has a striking, innovative quality. Ingres’ Jupiter is impassively powerful on his throne surrounded by clouds. His calm, regal posture makes him seem more formidable than often too-dramatically depicted mythic deities, and Ingres also has the physical figure of Jupiter impressively diminishing Thetis as she pleads on behalf of her son, the doomed warrior Achilles.
A known philanderer, Zeus pursued any nymph who caught his eye. In the case of Europa, Zeus changed himself into a bull and waited for the beautiful girl to come by and pet him. He then took off, still bullish and with Europa on his back, carrying her to the Island of Crete. Russian artist Valentin Serov recreated Europa’s famed abduction in a 1910 painting, but with simple, smoothly flowing lines and forms to give the scene a more modernist look.
Venus Enthroned
Venus, Roman goddess of love (called Aphrodite by the Greeks) was a major inspiration for centuries of painters, including the celebrated Botticelli Birth of Venus and Velazquez’s Rokeby Venus. Henrietta Rae’s Venus Enthroned (1905) offers a portrait of the most celebrated female goddess painted by an actual female, with a somewhat distracted, totally unclothed Venus amid doves and flowers. Rae, who studied with Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema and was married to fellow British artist Ernest Normand, did expert work with the nude figure. Unlike her male contemporaries, however, Rae once received a letter requesting that she please stop painting naked bodies and produce more respectable art.
Klimt’s Athena
Athena, known as Minerva to the Romans, was worshipped for her intelligence, bravery and chastity. In Gustav Klimt’s brilliant 1898 Pallas Athena, the daughter of Zeus seems timeless, wearing glittering armor and a golden helmet. Her eyes are penetrating, and one of her beloved owls hovers in the background as she balances feminine power in one hand while holding a spear with the other. Athena, incidentally, was named the patron goddess of Klimt’s Vienna Secession group of artists, which flourished at the turn of the 20th century.
Bacchus and De Kooning
Lusty Bacchus — Dionysus to the Greeks — was not surprisingly the focus of a long list of paintings, including two by the wild-living Caravaggio. Generally depicted as a handsomely debauched young man, Bacchus carried wine everywhere and wore a crown of grapes and grape leaves on his head. Bacchus also presided over drunken festivals known as Bacchanals and encouraged liberated behavior.
Bringing Bacchus into the late 1970s, Abstract Expressionist Elaine de Kooning produced a series of works inspired by a statue seen at the Jardin du Luxembourg. The canvases were huge, and the energy and spirit of the paintings evocative of the god himself — and in view of the many high times enjoyed in the 1970s, perhaps that was indeed a decade which needed to celebrate Bacchus again.
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