Polyphemus and Galatea

Agostino Santagostino, a painter and distinguished art critic in late seventeenth-century Milan, was the son of the artist Giovanni Antonio Santagostino, with whom he trained. He frequently collaborated with his brother Giacinto, and also painted an important work for the Sala dei Senatori in the Ducal Palace, David and the Prophet Samuel (now Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan). He also received a number of major eccclesiastical commissions in the city, including the Holy Family with Saint Anne and God the Father for the church of Sant'Alessandro (1677), and Scenes from the life of Sant'Antonio Maria Zaccaria for the Collegio di San Barnaba (1682). A leading art critic of his time, he published a treatise on Milanese painting in 1671, entitled L'immortalità et gloria del pennello.

Polyphemus and Galatea depicts an episode from Ovid's Metamorphoses (13: 750-897). Galatea, a sea-nymph, loved the handsome youth Acis and was herself loved by Polyphemus, the monstrous one-eyed giant. Wandering among the rocks one day by the sea, Polyphemus discovered Galatea in Acis' arms. As the couple tried to flee, the enraged Polyphemus hurled a huge boulder at Acis, killing him.