Art Institute of Chicago

Amphion and Zethus Delivering their Mother Antiope from the Fury of Dirce and Lycus

John FlaxmanLinkedCulture matchlcp-2b83b4e82941

Date: 1789
Medium: Pen and gray ink and brush and gray wash, over graphite, on gray laid paper, laid down on ivory wove paper
Culture: England
Department: Prints and Drawings
Institution: Art Institute of Chicago
Object ID: 217215

From the Art Institute of Chicago record

A British sculptor and draughtsman who created figural designs for famed ceramicist Josiah Wedgwood, John Flaxman had a taste for the Neoclassical, which led him to Rome in 1787. While in the Eternal City, Flaxman produced this study for a nine-by-five-foot bas-relief using several references from ancient Roman sculpture. The drawing exhibits Flaxman’s signature elegance in figural outlines. However, Flaxman felt the project was inadequate to establish his reputation as a sculptor, so he abandoned it and later reused two of the figures from this drawing in a different context.

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Provenance & credit

As published by the source institution. Coverage varies — not every institution's open-data feed includes ownership history.

Credit line: Gift of Dorothy Braude Edinburg to the Harry B. and Bessie K. Braude Memorial Collection
Provenance: Private collection, New York, to 2012. Sold by Lowell Libson, London, to Dorothy Braude Edinburg, Brookline, MA, Nov. 2012; given to the Art Institute of Chicago, 2013.