Cleveland Museum of Art
The Pyramid of Cestius, Rome
Michiel van OverbeekLinkedCulture matchlcp-5a3b18844050
- Date
- c. 1650–80
- Medium
- Pen and brown ink with red chalk on brown prepared paper
- Culture
- Netherlands
- Department
- Drawings
- Institution
- Cleveland Museum of Art
- Object ID
- 445054
From the Cleveland Museum of Art record
The Dutch artist Michiel Van Overbeek drew The Pyramid of Cestius, Rome from southwest of the site, looking toward the 12 BC Pyramid of Cestius, and the 3rd- to 4th-century Porta Ostiensis (Porta Santo Paulo). The Egyptian structure in the Roman countryside attracted many tourists, and artists, for its singularity within the Roman architectural landscape. The careful attention given to the rise of the land at left, with small abodes tucked into the hills, and the crumbling ruin at the right, suggest that Van Overbeek wanted to record the scene as accurately as possible. The Pyramid of Cestius was constructed in Rome as a tomb in 12 BC during a fad for Egyptian things just a few years after Rome had conquered Cleopatra’s Egypt (30 BC).
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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
- Mr. and Mrs. Richard W. Whitehill Art Purchase Endowment Fund
- Provenance
- ?-1854?: Possibly with Samuel Woodburn, London; his sale, Christie's London, June 16, 1854, lot 115, "M. Van Overbeck / Views of the principal buildings in Rome--a set of ten." | January 14, 1969: (Mak van Waay, Netherlands) | May 13, 1972: Herbert Lark | Private Collection, Southwest England | (P. & D. Colnaghi, London, England) | ?-2021: (Nonesuch Gallery, London, England) | September 13, 2021-: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
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