Perseus and Andromeda

Perhaps inspired by a delight in intricate and precious objects, and in the kunstkammer, an interest prevalent in Rome at the end of the 16th century, Cavaliere d'Arpino made a specialty of painting on a diverse range of supports. In addition to the present work executed on lapis lazuli, a stone used by artists to produce the most expensive form of blue pigment, d'Arpino also worked on glass, slate, canvas, and other precious and resilient types of stone. Small-scale paintings such as the present work, derived broadly from the practice of artists like Adam Elsheimer and Paul Bril who were working in Rome and whose subjects were often mythological and jewel-like in execution. The gentle eroticism suggests that the present work and others of a similar scale and sensuality (see for instance, Leda and the Swan, Christie's, New York, 12 January, 1996, lot 134) were intended as objects for private contemplation.

The subject of this painting is taken from Ovid's Metamorphoses (IV, 669ss) and was often treated by Cavaliere d'Arpino. The primary version is considered by Herwarth Röttgen to have been executed in circa 1592-3 (H. Röttgen, Il Cavaliere d'Arpino, 1973, no. 10). That work is now in the Rhode Island School of Design, and a studio version of it is in the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, Inv. no. 108. A closely related print by Hendrick Goltzius is recorded by Hollstein (no. 157). Another autograph version is in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.