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Tereus, King of Thrace and wife of Procne, raped his sister-in-law, Philomela, cutting out her tongue in order to avoid being denounced. But when Philomela weaves a tapestry, her sister Procne discove [+]
Proserpine, daughter of the earth goddess Ceres, was kidnapped by Pluto, the god of the underworld. Despite the resistance put up by Minerva, Venus and Diana, their relationship would blossom into lov [+]
As goddess of the Earth and agriculture, Ceres is depicted wearing a bundle of wheat spikes on her head. Beside her, Pan, the god of shepherds and herds, has a crown of oak leaves. Ceres symbolizes cu [+]
Mercury, the son of Jupiter and Maya, bears his characteristic attributes as the gods´ messenger: a winged hat and shoes, as well as the caduceus, a hazel wand with two serpents wound around it, which [+]
Goddess of grains and the harvest, Ceres holds some corn cobs in her right hand while, with the left, she holds a horn of plenty. Two nymphs fill the cornucopia with fruits, symbolizing the Earth´s ge [+]
This set of paintings on the five senses (Sight, Hearing, Smell, Taste, Touch) was one of the most successful collaborations of Peter Paul Rubens and Jan Brueghel “the Elder”. Rubens placed his figure [+]
According to Ovid (Metamorphosis, book V), in order to avoid her husband Jupiter´s infidelities, the goddess, Juno, converted the nymph, Io, into a lamb and called on Argos, the shepherd, to look afte [+]
Hercules was born from one of Jupiter´s affairs with a mortal. Though loved and protected by his father, he was repudiated by the latter´s wife, Juno. In order to insure his son´s immortality, Jupiter [+]
Portrayed as an old man in accordance with the conventional method that was faithful to prevailing iconographic precepts, in his right hand the god Saturn clasps a scythe, his inveterate attribute, us [+]
As Ovid tells in his Metamorphosis (book VIII, 260-444), the goddess Diana sent a giant wild boar to ravage the kingdom of Calydon. The king´s son, Meleager, and his beloved Atalanta organize a hunt w [+]
According to prophecy, Achilles was to die in the Trojan War. In order to avoid this, his mother hid him in the court of King Lycomedes, disguised as a woman. There, he spent time among the king´s dau [+]
Rubens combines various subjects in this work. The figure of Saint Joseph sleeping in a landscape alongside a grazing donkey, and the Virgin Mary sitting on a boulder with her son refer to the rest on [+]
Orpheus descends into the Underworld to recover his wife, Eurydice, who died after being bitten by a serpent. Pluto and Proserpina, the god and goddess of the underworld, are so moved by the music of [+]
The Greek philosopher, Heraclitus of Ephesus (540-470 B.C.), wears a black tunic and leans on a stone, weeping. He embodies the idea of a tragic sense of life, thinking about the future form a lonely [+]
The Cardinal-Infante is depicted in full body armor, with a black hat, a staff and a red sash. He is portrayed as a general of the Spanish Armies during the Battle of Nördlingen when, in 1634, th [+]
On a number of occasions, Peter Paul Rubens partially overpainted finished pictures. He did this to paintings by his own hand, such as Nymphs and Satyrs (P1666), which he retouched and enlarged twenty [+]
This set of paintings on the five senses (Sight, Hearing, Smell, Taste, Touch) was one of the most successful collaborations of Peter Paul Rubens and Jan Brueghel “the Elder”. Rubens placed his figure [+]
The Roman poet Ovid, in his book Metamorphosis (III, 401-532), tells the story of Diana and the nymph Callisto. Zeus was attracted to the nymph and took the form of Diana to seduce and rape her. Diana [+]
