THE ABDUCTION OF EUROPA. OIL ON CANVAS. Probably 18TH CENTURY, AFTER VERONESE.
Antiques -
Reference: ZF0971
Rape of Europa. Oil on canvas. Probably 18th century, based on a model by VERONESE, Paolo Caliari (Verona, 1528-Venice, 1588). Oil on canvas showing a scene from classical mythology set in a natural landscape with leafy trees and a fragment of pyramid-shaped ruins in the background. Note (from her clothing) that the female figure on a white bull in the group on the left is the same one that appears moving away on the animal on the right and, again, in the water, in the background of the composition. Europa was a Phoenician princess who was abducted by Zeus: the god transformed himself into a white bull and mingled with the cattle that the girl's father had. The girl saw him while she was gathering flowers with her entourage of ladies and when she saw the bull, she approached the animal. After verifying that it was tame, she ended up on its back, at which point Zeus took advantage of the opportunity to take her on his back to Crete, going into the sea. Paolo Caliari or Cagliari, better known as Paolo Veronese or Veronese, was a very important painter of Venetian Mannerism. He treated the same theme with a very similar composition in a canvas painted in 1573 and preserved in the Antecollegia of the Doge's Palace in Venice, and in another canvas dated between 1580 and 1585 that is in the Capitoline Museum in Rome. The present work is clearly based on the second painting mentioned, since it was a frequent source of inspiration for numerous painters and, particularly, for Spanish scholarship holders in Rome (the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Madrid preserves another Rape of Europa inspired by the same work by Veronese, but this one done by Alejandro de la Cruz, a student of Mengs who was granted a scholarship in 1765 by the Academy in Rome).
· Size: 191x7x158 cms. 167x134 cms.
6.000 €
