Bowdoin College Museum of Art | - Cupid Presenting Psyche to the Gods

Preview image of work. black and red chalk on blue laid paper, Cupid Presenting Psyche to the Gods 4591

1958.70

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Cupid Presenting Psyche to the Gods

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Artist

Giovanni Paolo Melchiori (Rome, Italy, 1664 - 1745, Rome, Italy)

Title

Cupid Presenting Psyche to the Gods

Creation Date

n.d.

Century

17th-18th century

Dimensions

11 in. x 23 3/8 in. (27.94 cm. x 59.37 cm.)

Object Type

drawing

Creation Place

Europe, Italy

Medium and Support

black and red chalk on blue laid paper

Credit Line

Bequest of Helen Johnson Chase

Copyright

This artwork may be under copyright. For further information, please consult the Museum’s Copyright Terms and Conditions.

Accession Number

1958.70

This compositional sketch is believed to render the scene from Apuleius’s novel “The Golden Ass,” or “Metamorphoses,” in which Psyche’s long separation from her lover, Cupid, is finally coming to a close. After proving her determination and unwavering affection, Psyche, a mortal woman, is invited to Mount Olympus, granted immortality, and united with Cupid. Already in antiquity this legend was interpreted allegorically, as the ascent of the human soul towards eternal life. A now obscure allegorical reading might also have prompted Giovanni Paolo Melchiori, a Roman artist in the circle of Carlo Maratti, to take on this subject. A famous precedent is Raphael’s painting in the Loggia di Psiche of the Villa Farnesina. Whether Melchiori completed a painting of the subject is unknown.

Keywords: angels work on paper master drawing figures (representations) mythological