Hercules and the Nemean Lion

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The late Mannerist composition, derived only generically from the Hercules groups of Giovanni Bologna, displays networks of interlocking triangular shapes, resulting from Hercules’ legs being stretched crosswise behind the lion. The base, a segmental arc, is especially curious. The chasing is closely controlled, almost like medallic engraving. The head seems to reflect the features of the Farnese Hercules and those of Henri IV, but a French facture is offered here only provisionally. Another cast cited by Bode as belonging to the Victoria and Albert Museum is not, in fact, there.[1] [James D. Draper, 1984] Footnotes: [1] W. von Bode, The Italian Bronze Statuettes of the Renaissance, London, III (1912), pl. CXCVIII, 2.

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