A Dancing Young Woman as Terpsichore (c. 1780): Art, History and Details

A Dancing Young Woman as Terpsichore (c. 1780) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Angelica Kauffmann (Swiss, 1741–1807).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This dancing figure was inspired by recently excavated wall paintings from the ancient Roman town of Herculaneum, during a period when neoclassical style was fashionable. Angelica Kauffmann was among the most important painters of the 1800s, achieving success for portraits and history subjects—a category dominated by men. Highly educated, Kauffmann was also an accomplished musician who had struggled to choose between a career in fine art or music.

Object facts

• Title: A Dancing Young Woman as Terpsichore
• Date: c. 1780
• Creator attribution: Angelica Kauffmann (Swiss, 1741–1807)
• Culture: England
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on canvas
• Dimensions: Overall: 91.5 x 70.8 cm (36 x 27 7/8 in.)
• Collection: Paintings
• Department: European Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 2025.3

A detail from the museum

In 1768, Kauffmann was a founder member of the Royal Academy of Arts, which didn’t admit another woman as a full academician until 1936.

Collection credit

Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.