Liberal Arts Blog — Perseus And The Head Of Medusa (Canova) — Metropolitan Museum Of Art (NYC)
Liberal Arts Blog: Friday is the Joy of Art, Architecture, Design, Film, Fashion, and All Things Visual Day
Today's Topic: Perseus and the Head of Medusa (Canova) - Metropolitan Museum of Art (NYC)
One of the most unforgettable items in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City is Canova's "Perseus with the Head of Medusa." It is prominently displayed, You can't miss it. Who was Perseus?
Who was Medusa? What other sculptors did famous versions of this iconic moment in Greek mythology?
Today, a few notes. And two other versions - one by Benvenuto Cellini. The other by Salvador Dali.
Experts - please chime in. Correct, elaborate, elucidate.
PERSEUS - ONE OF THE GREAT GREEK HEROES BEFORE HERCULES WHO WAS BOTH HIS GREAT GRAND CHILD AND HIS HALF BROTHER AS THEY SHARED A FATHER (ZEUS) BUT THE MOTHER OF HERCULES WAS THE GRANDDAUGHTER OF PERSEUS (below the version by Canova in the Met in NYC)
1. "The legendary founder of the Perseid dynasty. He was, alongside Cadmus and Bellerophon, the greatest Greek hero and slayer of monsters before the days of Heracles."
2. "He beheaded the Gorgon Medusa fo Polydectes and saved Andromeda from the sea monster Cetus."
3. He is a demigod as his father was a god (Zeus) and his mother a mortal (Danae). He is the founder of the city of Mycenae.
NB: Perseus used the head of Medusa as a weapon that turned his enemies to stone. Medusa was one of the three "Gorgon sisters" - and the only one of the three who was mortal - "a woman with living snakes in place of hair."
ANTONIO CANOVA (1757-1822) - "often regarded as the greatest of neoclassical artists" (below a self-portrait, 1792)
1. "His sculpture was inspired by the Baroque and the classical revival, and has been characterized as having avoided the melodramatics of the former, and the cold artificiality of the latter."
2. "By 1800, Canova was the most celebrated artist in Europe...Among his patrons were Napoleon and his family, for whom Canova produced much work, including several depictions between 1803 and 1809."
3. "In 1820, he made a statue of George Washington for the state of North Carolina. As recommended by Thomas Jefferson, the sculptor used the marble bust of Washington by Giuseppe Ceracchi as a model. It was delivered on 24 December 1821. The statue and the North Carolina State House where it was displayed, were later destroyed by fire in 1831. A plaster replica was sent by King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy in 1910, now on view at the North Carolina Museum of History. A marble copy was sculpted by Romano Vio in 1970, now on view in the rotunda of the capitol building."
THE VERSION BY BENVENUTO CELLINI IN THE LOGGIA DEI LANZI IN THE PIAZZA DELLA SIGNORIA IN FLORENCE
1. "When the piece was revealed to the public on 27 April 1554, Michelangelo's "David," Bandinellli's "Hercules and Cacus," and Donatello's "Judith and Holofernes" were already installed in the piazza." Imagine that!
2. Perseus stands "on the slain Medusa's headless corpse."
3. Cellini's autobiography has been called both "the most delightful autobiography ever written" and "one of the most important documents of the 16th century." I haven't read it. Have you?
Below: Salvador Dali's version of Cellini's version of "Perseus and the Head of Medusa" in Mabella, Spain on the Avenida del Mar. Are you a fan of Dali? Favorite painting? "Persistence of Memory"? Speaking of which, what to you, is the most memorable art work of the Metropolitan Museum of Art ini NYC? how about any museum, anywhere, ever?
Perseus with the Head of Medusa - Wikipedia
The Persistence of Memory - Wikipedia
QUOTE OF THE MONTH
"Make your own Bible. Select and collect all the words and sentences that in all your readings have been to you like the blast of a trumpet."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
My spin - then periodically review, re-rank, and exchange your list with those you love. I call this the "Orion Exchange" because seven is about as many as any human can digest at a time. Game?
LAST FOUR YEARS OF POSTS ORGANIZED THEMATICALLY
Updating PDFs: 2023 - Google Drive
ATTACHMENTS BELOW:
#1 A graphic guide to justice (9 metaphors on one page).
#2 “39 Songs, Prayers, and Poems: the Keys to the Hearts of Seven Billion People” — Adams House Senior Common Room Presentation, (11/17/20)
NB: Palestine Orion (Decision) - let's exchange Orions, let's find Rumi's field ("Beyond all ideas of right and wrong, there is a field. Meet me there" Rumi, 13 century Persian Sufi mystic)
YOUR TURN
Please share the coolest thing you learned recently or ever related to art, sculpture, design, architecture, film, or anything visual.
This is your chance to make someone else's day. And to cement in your own memory something cool or important you might otherwise forget. Or to think more deeply than you otherwise would about something that is close to your heart.
