Diana and Cupid

Pompeo Batoni Italian

Not on view

The painting was executed for Sir Humphrey Morice (1723–1785), son of a wealthy merchant and director of the Bank of England. Morice was a great animal lover and commissioned from Batoni a portrait of himself reclining in the Roman countryside after the hunt as a pendant to this canvas, which shows the goddess of the hunt withholding the bow from Cupid. Although full of extraordinary warmth and feeling, the figure of Diana is based on a celebrated ancient statue of the sleeping Ariadne in the Vatican. The painting may have been conceived as Batoni's response to his rival, Anton Raphael Mengs, who championed the Neoclassical style.

#5096. Diana and Cupid

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Diana and Cupid, Pompeo Batoni (Italian, Lucca 1708–1787 Rome), Oil on canvas

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