Cupid before Jupiter amid Clouds

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Unlike most of the other stones discussed here, this opaque blue-green mineral, a uranium-bearing aragonite, is soft and was easily worked to encourage generously rounded shapes. The hearty style lent itself to the embellishment of rich domestic furnishings such as cabinets. A cameo with Neptune and Galatea, larger but otherwise identical to this one in signature and workmanship, was on the Amsterdam antiques market in 1974.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art