Media Information

 
 
 
Collection:
ADJUNCT MODULE A: ITALIAN ART
Preferred Title:
Apollo and Daphne
Image View:
Detail, sculpted plant on rocky base
Creator:
Cardinal Scipione Borghese (Italian patron, 1576-1633); Gian Lorenzo Bernini (Italian sculptor, 1598-1680)
Location:
repository: Galleria Borghese (Rome, Lazio, Italy) inv. CV
Location Note:
Piazzale del Museo Borghese 5
GPS:
41.914 12.492
Date:
1622-1624 (creation)
Cultural Context:
Italian
Style Period:
Baroque
Work Type 1:
sculpture (visual work)
Classification:
sculpture
Material:
Carrara marble
Technique:
carving (processes)
Measurements:
243 cm (height)
Description:
The spectacular Apollo and Daphne was inspired by a passage in Ovid’s Metamorphoses and was conceived, in part, as a challenge to both poetry and painting. The metamorphosis of Daphne into a laurel tree is a technical tour de force representing an apparent transmutation of marble into leaves, bark, cloth and flesh. This hallucinatory realism is matched by an extraordinary temporal innovation. The group was originally placed in a room against an interior wall close to two corner doors. Upon entering, the viewer would see only the back of Apollo and his flowing drapery, the drama unfolding in real time and space as the spectator went further into the room. Here Bernini controlled the viewer’s experience, as he did later on a much larger scale in St. Peter’s. (Source: Grove Art Online; http://www.oxfordart online.com/)
Collection:
Adjunct Module A: Italian Art
Identifier:
7A1-BG-BG-AAD-F02
Rights:
© Scott Gilchrist, Archivision, Inc.

Apollo and Daphne