Images(7)

Perseus Arming

Maker Alfred Gilbert (British, 1854 - 1934)

Collections

Art Collectors' Council: 1995 - 2022

ClassificationsSCULPTURE

Dateca. 1882

Mediumcirce perdue cast bronze

Dimensionsheight: 29 in. (73.7 cm.)

DescriptionThis statuette, cast in bronze by the British sculptor Sir Alfred Gilbert, represents the mythological hero and demi-god Perseus. Gilbert shows Perseus in a scene from Ovid's Metmorphoses, in which the young hero, the son of Zeus and the mortal woman Danae, puts on the winged sandals of Hermes, his half-brother, and takes up the curved sword of Minerva, his half-sister, before his departure to save the life of Andromeda. Gilbert depicts the young Perseus caught in a posture that is both awkward and full of boyish grace. His body bends to the right in a taut arc, the left hand clenched around the hilt of his sword, and the right arm raised but inert. Perseus Arming is the study of a young man still in a state of anticipation of the perils and tests looming before him, and it was intended by the artist as a thematic and autobiographical exploration of the very process of preparing to face the challenges of adulthood and maturity. Incorporating his own preoccupations into the sculpture, Gilbert said that he "conceived the idea that Perseus before becoming a hero was a mere mortal, and that he had to look to his equipment." He portrays this supple, graceful youth caught in a somewhat anxious, yet exquisite balletic movement. Gilbert is one of the sculptors credited with reviving an appreciation for Florentine Renaissance bronze casting in late 19th-century Britain. In this sculpture, Gilbert pays tribute to the great Renaissance bronze by Donatello of David. The lithe figure, downcast eyes and elegant serpentine pose of Perseus Arming are a reference to this famous sculpture. However, Gilbert tempered his deliberate appeal to the classical tradition, with striking innovations that look forward to 20th-century stylistic departures from established conventions. His astonishing attention to naturalistic surface details, as seen in his elaboration of the straining muscles of the left forearm, which tightly grips the sword add a powerful physicality to his work and identified him as a leader of The New Sculpture movement, which set a new directions for the following generations of modern sculptors. Gilbert sculpted the initial plaster of Perseus Arming in 1880-81. The finished bronze was exhibited in 1882 at Grovesnor Gallery, a bastion of Aestheticism, which emerged at this time in Britain and America. Both popular and influential, Perseus Arming was subsequently cast several times in three different sizes. Although undated, the cast is of the same dimensions as the 1882 cast and exhibits the fine chasing and patinating which Gilbert contributed to each cast, as seen here in the hand chasing in the wing attached to his sandal, his fingernails, and his sword.

Credit LineThe Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens. Purchased with funds from the Art Collectors' Council

Status

On view

Object number2005.4