Ceres and Phytalus
c. 1662
Medium
Etching with drypoint in black on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
Image/plate: 35.2 × 23.6 cm (13 7/8 × 9 5/16 in.); Sheet: 46.4 × 33.6 cm (18 5/16 × 13 1/4 in.)
Classification
etching
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
216039
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
Salvator Rosa produced 17 large etchings in the early 1660s, frequently adopting mythological lore peppered with classical literature. Ceres and Phytalus deliciously celebrates the fig, of which Rosa was particularly fond. Phytalus, a king of Attica, is said to have given the goddess Ceres shelter on her journey to find her daughter Proserpina, whom Pluto had abducted into the underworld. Rosa’s inscription reads, “Here the hero Phytalus had received Ceres into his house, on whom she first besto...
About the Artist
Salvator Rosa · 1615–1673
Salvator Rosa was born in 1615 in Arenella, on the outskirts of Naples, into a world of artistic ambition and turbulent talent. His early training came through his maternal uncle, the painter Paolo Greco, and his brother-in-law Francesco Fracanzano, himself a pupil of the great Spanish-born Neapolitan master Jusepe de Ribera. Rosa showed a fierce independence from the start, resisting his father's...