"This makes you think about beauty and especially female beauty as being both enchanting and dangerous."
Curator Kiki Karaglou on a Greek sphinx that served as a grave marker and was thought to be a guardian of the dead.
Explore this object:
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/248501
Throughout 2013, The Met invited curators from across the Museum to each talk about one artwork that changed the way they see the world. Each episode is interpreted by a Museum photographer.
Photography by Katherine Dahab
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Why is the sphinx considered a guardian figure?
"This makes you think about beauty and especially female beauty as being both enchanting and dangerous."
Kiki Karoglou
2 min. watch
Contributors
Kiki Karoglou
Assistant Curator, Department of Greek and Roman Art
Assistant Curator, Department of Greek and Roman Art
Art Mentioned
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Greek, Attic
ca. 530 BCE
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