Galatea1.0047

Galatea1.0047_Poussin

Ovid Met. 13.738-897
Theocritus, Id. 11
Apollod. Libr. 1.2.7
Royal Library, Windsor

Nicolas Poussin, 1594-1665, "Polyphemus, Acis and Galatea," 1620-1623, drawing illustrating Ovid for G. B. Marino (for unpublished edition of Metamorphoses), Royal Library, Windsor Castle, no. 11939 or 11940.

Polyphemus spies Acis and Galatea and realizes his love for her is fully rejected. In the traditional myth, the Cyclops will next crush Acis under a rock. According to Ovid, Galatea will turn her partner into a river that will bear his name.

C. Allen: "Poussin has tried to convey as clearly as he can both the physical situation and the contrasting passions of the protagonists at teh moment when Polyphemus catches the lovers in the forest, just before Galatea sees him." Contrast this with the painting executed in 1628-30 (=1.0048_Poussin), which is no longer a sensationalistic and literal narrative, but a poetic meditation on desire, reciprocity and loneliness. Poussin's understanding of the story has deepened both in a greater familiarity with Ovid's text and its own sources, and in an independent reflection on the significance of the subject." "(Cambridge Companion to Ovid, p. 351.)

OGCMA slides are designed by Roger T. Macfarlane for use in Classical Civilization 241 courses at Brigham Young University.
The present resource contains information assembled for The Oxford Guide to Classical Mythology in the Arts, 1300 - 1990's, edited by J. Davidson Reid (Oxford 1994), and it is used with express permission from Oxford University press.
Address concerns or inquiries to macfarlane@byu.edu.