Mercury and Argus

Expand

IIIFView PDF

Mercury and Argus

Artist Pierre-Etienne Monnot (French, 1657-1733)

Place of OriginFrance

Dateabout 1720-1730

Dimensions19 3/4 × 31 5/16 × 16 in. (50.2 × 79.5 × 40.6 cm)

Mediummarble

ClassificationSculpture

Credit LineMrs. C. Lockhart McKelvy Fund

Object number

1992.26

Not on View

Label TextThis intriguing marble carving, a combination of relief and fully in-the-round sculpture, wonderfully demonstrates the artist’s skill at conveying contrasting surfaces–scraped, faceted, and polished. The subject is taken from ancient Roman poet Ovid’s Metamorphoses and is the last moment in a story concerning divine infidelity, jealousy, and revenge. The ever philandering Jupiter, king of the gods, had wooed the water nymph Io. Jupiter’s wife Juno, noticing her husband’s absence, likewise descends to earth. Anticipating her arrival, however, Jupiter changed Io into a white heifer, whereupon Juno, unfooled, asks for the cow as a gift. Ensnared, Jupiter relinquishes Io-as-cow to her. Fearing further treachery from her faithless husband, Juno turns Io over to the giant Argus for safekeeping. Jupiter, full of remorse for Io’s unfortunate plight, sends the messenger god Mercury to slay Argus. Pierre-Etienne Monnot depicts the moment when, with the form of Io as backdrop, Mercury is ready to strike the death blow to the neck of Argus.Published ReferencesAgnew's 175th Anniversary, London, 1992, no. 32, repr. (as Monnot).

Bacchi, Andrea and Francesco Freddolini, Giovanni Baratta: due Modelli Fiorentini in Terracotta, Milan, Walter Padovani, 2010, fig. 33, repr. (col.) p. 38 (as Giovanni Baratta)

Exhibition HistoryLondon, Agnew's, Master Drawings and Sculpture, 1989, no. 72, (as Italian School, first half 18th century).