The Discovery of Honey by Bacchus
Artist
Piero di Cosimo
(Italian, 1462–1522)
Dateabout 1499
Mediumoil on panel
Dimensionspanel: 79.2 x 128.4 cm (31 3/16 x 50 9/16 in.)
framed: 97.2 × 146.7 × 12.5 cm (38 1/4 × 57 3/4 × 4 15/16 in.)
framed: 97.2 × 146.7 × 12.5 cm (38 1/4 × 57 3/4 × 4 15/16 in.)
ClassificationsPaintings
Credit LineMuseum Purchase
Object number1937.76
DescriptionIn this landscape, Bacchus and Ariadne, right foreground, are accompanied by groupings of satyrs and maenads who wield a variety of noise-making instruments. A swarm of bees settles on a hollow tree in the center foreground. The landscape in the right background is wild and forbidding while the town in the left background is idyllic. The light is warm, casting the scene in sun and shadow. Touches of red across the canvas lead to Bacchus and Ariadne.Label TextPiero di Cosimo, who painted a number of important religious pictures, was a rather mysterious artist, his eccentric personality reflected especially in his paintings of strange animals and fantastic scenes. In this allegorical setting the mythological figures of Bacchus and Ariadne, in the right foreground, are accompanied by satyrs and maenads who make noise to attract a swarm of bees to settle in a hollow tree. The result is the discovery of honey, considered a step forward in the history of civilization which is symbolized in the background by the juxtaposition of an idyllic view of a town (on the left) and a wild and forbidding landscape (on the right). This painting resulted from the private patronage that developed in fifteenth-century Italy. Representative of a new demand for secular subjects, The Discovery of Honey by Bacchus is one of a pair of panels commissioned for the home of Giovanni Vespucci of Florence. The other, now in the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, is titled The Misfortune of Silenus.ProvenanceVespucci Palace, Florence, Italy, 1499; by descent in the family; house and pictures sold to Piero Salviati, 1533; by descent to Giovanni de' Bardi di Vernio, until at least 1584. Sir Thomas Sebright (b. 1802-d. 1864), Beechwood Park, England, by 1857; by descent in the Sebright Collection to Sir GIles Sebright (b. 1896-d. 1957), until 1935; purchased by the Worcester Art Museum from Vitale Bloch (dealer), London, 1937.
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