Head of a Goddess (Aphrodite or Artemis)

Expand

IIIFView PDF

Head of a Goddess (Aphrodite or Artemis)

Place of OriginLikely Italy (acquired in Rome)

DateLate 2nd or 1st century BCE

DimensionsH: 13 1/8 in. (33.3 cm)

MediumParian marble (specifically Paros 1 / Lychnites), confirmed by isotopic analysis.

ClassificationSculpture

Credit LinePurchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey

Object number

1937.5

Not on View

DescriptionMarble head and upper torso of a young female figure, preserved to the shoulders and designed for insertion into a larger statue. The head is life-sized, turned slightly to the figure’s left and tilted, creating a sense of motion. The hair is centrally parted and drawn back, bound by a fillet visible on the right side, and gathered into a large chignon low at the back. A groove and hole around the chignon likely held a metal ornament. Carved in the round. The statue was constructed using the piecing technique common in the Hellenistic period, rather than being carved from a single block. The fragment represents a section carefully crafted for assembly. The top of the cranium is missing and shows tooling marks, possibly for the attachment of another marble piece or indicating it was unfinished or intended to be viewed from below. The hair above the fillet appears more roughly worked. The drapery on the back retains drill and chisel marks. The finish is not highly polished, contributing to the soft modelling.

Label TextThis marble head belonged to a life-sized statue of a goddess, possibly Artemis or Aphrodite. It was made around 100 BCE during the late Hellenistic period, a time when sculptors experimented with dynamic poses and modular construction. The head, carved from Parian marble, was not broken off—it was designed to join with a separately carved body. This method allowed for complex compositions and more precise carving. The head tilts forward and turns slightly to the left, creating a sense of quiet movement. The face is smooth and idealized: a high forehead, soft cheeks, and gently shadowed eyes. The hair is parted at the center and drawn back into a knot, where a carved groove may have held a metal band. A garment strap slips down the figure’s right shoulder, a detail seen in depictions of Aphrodite as well as more generic figures such as the so-called Maiden of Anzio. The sculpture shares similarities with the Chios Head and Bartlett Head in Boston.Published ReferencesBulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1917, p. 99.

Richter, Gisela M.A., "A Greek Head in the Goldman Collection," Art in America, vol. 5, 1917, April, pp. 130-134, repr.

"Loans in the Classical Department", Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1920, p. 177-178, fig. 1.

Valentiner, Wilhelm Reinhold,The Henry Goldman Collection, New York, 1922.

"A Praxitelean Head", Toledo Museum of Art Museum News, June 1937, repr. cover.

Pach, Walter, Art Museums in America, New York, 1948, p. 181.

His, vol. 21, no. 6, March 1961, repr. p. 6.

Toledo Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collections, 1966, repr. p. [7]

Cheal, Catherine, “Five Unbaked Clay Statues from Salamis, Cyprus,” Numismatica e Antichità Classiche, vol. 9, 1980, p. 130.

Ridgeway, Brunhilde Sismondo, Hellenistic Sculpture II: the Styles of 200-100 B.C., Madison, 2000, pp. 241, 260, no. 31, pl. 69 a-b.

Polański, Tomasz, Ancient Greek Orientalist Painters: The Literary Evidence, Kraków, Księgarnia Akademicka, 2002, p. 219.

Knudsen, Sandra E., Craine, Clifford, and Tykot, Robert H., “Analysis of Classical Marble Sculptures in the Toledo Museum of Art,” in Herrmann, John J. Jr., Herz, Norman, and Newman, Richard, eds., ASMOSIA 5: Interdisciplinary Studies on Ancient Stone, (London: Archetype Publications, 2002), 234, no. 2, fig. 3.

Bilde, Pia Guldager. “Wandering Images: From Taurian (and Chersonesean) Parthenos to (Artemis) Tauropolos and (Artemis) Persike.” In The Cauldron of Ariantas: Studies Presented to A.N. Ščeglov on the Occasion of His 70th Birthday, edited by Pia Guldager Bilde, Jakob Munk Højte, and Vladimir F. Stolba, Aarhus, Aarhus University Press, 2003, pp. 172–173, fig. 6.

Bilde, Pia Guldager, “Что скифского было в ‘Скифской Диане’ из Неми? / What was Scythian about the ‘Scythian Diana’ at Nemi?,” Археологические вести, vol. 12, 2005, 209–217.

Duncan, Sally Anne and Andrew McClellan, The Art of Curating: Paul J. Sachs and the Museum Course at Harvard, Los Angeles, The Getty Research Institute, 2018, pp. 13, 118-119, p. 12, fig. 6.

Collins-Clinton, Jacquelyn, Cosa: The Sculpture and Furnishings in Stone and Marble, Ann Arbor, University of Michigan Press, 2020, pp. 90–92 [incorrectly cited as 27.5].

Exhibition History

New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art (lent by Henry Goldman), 1917

New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 50th Anniversary of the Founding of the Metropolitan, 1920.