Allegory of Spring

Artist Francesco de Mura (Italian, 1696-1782)

Place of OriginNaples, Italy

Date1759

DimensionsOverall: 40 1/2 x 51 in. (102.9 x 129.5 cm)
Frame: 46 × 56 3/4 × 2 5/8 in. (116.8 × 144.1 × 6.7 cm)

MediumOil on canvas

ClassificationPaintings

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

Object number

1979.79

Not on View

Collections

Paintings

Published References"La chronique des arts," Gazette des Beaux-Arts, no. 1334, Mar. 1980, vol. 77.

1979 Annual Report, Toledo Museum of Art Museum News, vol. 21, no. 4, 1979, p. 84, repr.

Spinosa, Nicola, Pittura napoletana del settecento, dal barocco al rococò, Naples, 1988, no. 276, p. 165, fig. 333, p. 357.

Hall, Nicholas H. J., ed. Colnaghi in America, New York, 1992, p. 133 (listed).

Coates, Victoria C. Gardner, The Last Days of Pompeii: Decadence, Apocalypse, Resurrection, Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012, p. 17, fig.1, repr. (col) p. 16.

Blumenthal, Arthur R., In the Light of Naples: the Art of Francesco de Mura,Winter Park, FL, D Giles Limited, 2016, cat. no. 33, repr. (col.) p. 167, repr. (col. det.) pp.76-77, 168-169.

Label TextThe inspiration for this painting comes from the first stanzas of an ode by the ancient Roman poet Horace. The ode describes the renewal of Spring in terms of Greek and Roman myth: Winter to Spring: the west wind melts the frozen rancour, The windlass drags to sea the thirsty hull; Byre is no longer welcome to beast or fire to ploughman, The field removes the frost-cap from its skull. Venus of Cythera leads the dances under the hanging Moon and the linked line of Nymphs and Graces Beat the ground with measured feet while the busy Fire god Stokes his red-hot mills in volcanic places. [translation by Louis MacNeice] Francesco de Mura shows Venus, goddess of love, seated amongst the dancing Nymphs and Graces. In the background Vulcan, “the busy Fire god” (from whom “volcano” takes its name), works with his assistants at his blacksmith’s forge on the slopes of the erupting Mt. Vesuvius. De Mura was court painter to Charles III of Naples, for whom this painting may have been commissioned. Charles III financed early digging at the sites of Pompeii and Herculaneum.