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Hercules and the Cretan Bull

Attributed (Swiss, active in England, 1741 - 1825)
Former (British, 1757 - 1827)
ClassificationsDRAWINGS
Daten.d.
Mediumpen
Dimensions11 3/4 × 15 3/4 in. (29.8 × 40 cm.) mat: 22 × 16 in. (55.9 × 40.6 cm.)
InscribedInscribed in lower right in ink: W. Blake 17[cut off] [over a very light pencil inscription, perhaps: W. S.] Inscribed in lower left in pencil: Blake / 1779
Credit LineThe Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens
Label TextIn Hercules’ seventh labor (of twelve), he is tasked with subduing the bull from the sea that Poseidon had sent to King Minos of Crete.

Fuseli closely based his Hercules on one of the two athletes (sometimes identified as the Dioscuri, or Castor and Pollux) from the ancient sculpture called the Horse Tamers on the Quirinal Hill in Rome, a work Fuseli greatly admired. He presents Hercules foreshortened as if seen from below, his recipe for creating a sense of “Grandeur” in art.

(Eccentric Visions, 2015)

Status
Not on view
Object number000.61
Terms
    Venus and Cupid
    Henry Fuseli
    n.d.
    Object number: 59.55.547
    Siegfried Overcoming Alberich
    Henry Fuseli
    1805 (?)
    Object number: 57.14
    Ixion Worshipping Hera Disguised as a Cloud
    Henry Fuseli
    n.d.
    Object number: 59.55.546
    Woman with a Diadem
    Henry Fuseli
    n.d.
    Object number: 82.186.5
    Una and the Lion
    Henry Fuseli
    n.d.
    Object number: 63.52.85
    Haemon Discovering the Body of Antigone
    Henry Fuseli
    1800
    Object number: 000.98
    Johann Jacob Bodmer
    Henry Fuseli
    n.d.
    Object number: 64.7
    Hercules Murdering his Children
    David Scott
    1837
    Object number: 63.43
    Atlas and Hercules
    Edward Francis Burney
    n.d.
    Object number: 76.16C
    Hercules
    Edward Francis Burney
    n.d.
    Object number: 76.16A
    The Three Witches
    Henry Fuseli
    ca. 1785
    Object number: 2014.15