Bacchanal
1633/78
Medium
Etching on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
12.3 × 40.6 cm (4 7/8 × 16 in.)
Classification
etching
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
45035
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
The 18th-century author P. A. Orlandi once described Carpioni’s mythological etchings as “perfect conceptions, such as dreams, sacrifices, bacchanals, triumphs, dances of ‘putti,’ the most attractive caprices and fantasies that a painter, inclined to work on a small scale, has ever conceived.” This bacchanal of dwarf-like humans and shaggy satyr youths becomes more enigmatic with the addition of the figures at right. The naked man lounges in the pose of a statue of a river god, but his placement...
About the Artist
Giulio Carpioni · 1613–1678
Comment on works: Allegory; Mythology