Arion on a Sea Horse and Bacchante on a Panther (pair) (1855): Art, History and Details

Arion on a Sea Horse and Bacchante on a Panther (pair) (1855) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is William Adolphe Bouguereau (French, 1825–1905).

The work and its context

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

These paintings are from a series of eight works that Bouguereau painted for a Parisian home decorated in the style inspired by ancient Roman wall paintings found at Pompeii. The ancient Greek poet Arion escaped pirates by fleeing on the back of a sea creature attracted by the poet's singing. In the companion picture, a bacchante, a female follower of the Roman god Bacchus, rides a panther and carries a pinecone-tipped spear called a thyrsus. The figures are silhouetted against a gold honeycomb–patterned background evoking ancient Roman mosaics Bouguereau had studied in Italy. The soft, waxy flesh tones and glimmering gold leaf were calculated to come to life when viewed under the mansion's gas lighting.

Object facts

• Title: Arion on a Sea Horse and Bacchante on a Panther (pair)
• Date: 1855
• Creator attribution: William Adolphe Bouguereau (French, 1825–1905)
• Culture: France, 19th century
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on fabric
• Dimensions: Framed: 87.3 x 127 x 5.4 cm (34 3/8 x 50 x 2 1/8 in.); Unframed: 71.3 x 111.8 cm (28 1/16 x 44 in.)
• Collection: Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960
• Department: Modern European Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1980.238

Collection credit

Bequest of Noah L. Butkin

Further reading listed by the museum

• Weeda, Eddy, Joop Schaminée and Nils van Rooijen. Botanische meesterwerken: bij het 170-jarig bestaan van de Koninklijke Nederlandse Botanische Vereniging. 2016.
• Jullian, Philippe. "The Symbolists." Architectural Digest 31 (January/February 1975): 58-63.
• Lee, Sherman E. “The Year in Review for 1980.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 68, no. 6 (June 1981): 163–219.

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.