Sappho Recalled to Life by the Charm of Music
Item
-
Title
-
Sappho Recalled to Life by the Charm of Music
-
Rights
-
Norton Simon Museum, California. © The Norton Simon Foundation, non-commercial use permitted.
-
Creator
-
Louis Ducis (1775-1847)
-
Date
-
1811
-
Description
-
This painting illustrates the melancholy of Sappho upon being abandoned by her lover Phaon, as depicted in the famous tragedies circulating in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The setting is indoors with brown walls and a doorway covered by fabric with the sky and a treetop peeking over the top of the hanging fabric. Sappho lays on a lounge chair with pink cushions and a baby blue blanket in the center right of the piece, wearing white and yellow fabric with her chest partially uncovered. Her head lays back, looking up toward the ceiling, upon the knee of an older man with white and red robes. He has long hair and a beard covering his neck with a golden yellow ribbon in his hair. He cups part of Sappho’s neck as he holds his right hand out toward the three attendants performing music to quell Sappho’s melancholy. His left foot rests on a short wooden stool at her side. A female attendant in white robes sits in a wooden chair at the foot of her bed on the left, playing a golden string instrument. Behind her is a woman in light gray and sage green robes with a double horn instrument. Behind Sappho to the right of the aforementioned woman is a man whose torso is left uncovered with a yellow robe as he plays a lyre.
-
Format
-
Oil on canvas. 45 3/8 x 57 5/8 in.
-
Publisher
-
Norton Simon Museum.
-
Contributor
-
Shenai Beyale
-
Identifier
-
The Norton Simon Foundation. F.1983.10.P
-
Subject
-
Sappho; tragedy; play; opera; Phaon; painting; art
-
Source
-
Jpg file. The Norton Simon Foundation. 10/28/2025. https://www.nortonsimon.org/art/detail/F.1983.10.P/
