Cleveland Museum of Art

Diana's Return from the Chase (from Set of Ovid's Metamorphoses)

Gobelins Manufactory

Date

1704–1731

Medium

tapestry weave

Culture

France, 18th century

Department

Textiles

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

This tapestry’s elaborate border emulates a gilt picture frame, a key characteristic of eighteenth-century Gobelins tapestries. It portrays the goddess Diana at two distinct moments, during and following the hunt, the first accompanied by three dogs, and the second reclining among five attendants. The figures are positioned in a lush landscape near a small stream. A putto, poised to place an arrow in his bow, hovers above Diana. Goddess of the hunt and associated with wild animals and the moon, Diana can be identified by the crescent worn above her forehead. The dead hares indicate a successful hunt. During the French Revolution, Gobelins tapestries were sometimes disassembled to harvest the gold threads.

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