Diana's bath
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| Diana's bath |
|---|
| Il Guercino , ca.1620 |
| Oil on canvas |
| 36.5 × 53.5 cm |
| Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum , Rotterdam |
The Bath of Diana is a painting by the Italian baroque painter Giovanni Francesco Barbieri , called Il Guercino . It was created around 1620 after the painter stayed in Venice.
Image content
Two women can be seen on the left side of the painting. The last rays of the setting sun capture the two undressed women. One of the women turns her back to the viewer and is drying her left leg. The second woman can be seen in profile. She is bent forward while she hides her head and torso under a white sheet. The servant on the left is partially cut off from the edge of the canvas. She carries a bowl and a red cloth to the woman on the left.
In the darkness of the right side of the picture, two dogs tear apart a deer. This makes it possible to assign the image to Greek mythology. According to Ovid, Aktaion wandered carelessly through the forest, surprising Diana, who was bathing. Stripped of her bow, Aktaion splashed her with the water of the spring. As a result, Aktaion grew antlers from the middle of the forehead, his ears became longer and longer, hands and feet turned into cloven hooves and a piebald skin covered his body. His own dogs chased the deer-turned Aktaion and eventually tore him apart.
literature
- Jacques Bonnet: The Bathers - Voyeurism in Western Art , Parthas Verlag, Berlin 2006, ISBN 978-3-86601-088-8