George Romney Jupiter Seated On His Globe With A Female Figure Facing Him, A Group Of Classical Figures Beyond (recto) Pen and brown ink In this enigmatic scene, a goddess is shown begging a favour of Jupiter. It could be Thetis or Juno, and it seems very probable that this plea concerns the Trojan war. This idea is confirmed by the presence of the other gods on the right: Minerva with her helmet and shield, Mars with his helmet and sword, Venus, and Cupid. Subjects after Homer were particularly favoured at the end of the eighteenth century in England. On the verso are costume studies which are annotated with numbers to indicate the different colours of the material. The subsidiary study of the head on the verso shows the pervasive influence of Henry Fuseli with whom Romney worked in Rome. We are grateful to Paul Taylor from the Warburg Institute for his help in identifying the subject. |
|
