Medea

William Wetmore Story

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In the ancient Greek tragedy by Euripides, Medea was the sorceress who assisted Jason in obtaining the Golden Fleece and later became his wife. When he abandoned her, Medea murdered their two children and planned the death of his new love, Creusa. To nineteenth-century theater audiences, Medea was a sympathetic character forced to choose between relinquishing her children and protecting them by destroying them herself. Story similarly deemphasized Medea’s revenge, leaving to the viewer’s imagination the scene of infanticide to come.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art