Satyress
Giovanni Maria Mosca (Italian, 1495/99–1574)
c. 1525–1528
Medium
bronze
Dimensions
16.5 × 11.5 cm
Classification
Sculpture
Department
European Painting and Sculpture
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Severance A. Millikin
Accession Number
1947.29
Tags
male
About this artwork
In antiquity, satyrs were lustful woodland deities who delighted in wine and revelry. Renaissance artists adopted them as symbols of vice and carnal love; the female satyr, or satyress, on this bronze plaquette, recently reattributed from Riccio to Mosca, was probably derived from a copper engraving of a Roman sarcophagus by Marcantonio Raimondi (c. 1470/82-1527/34). Both the sarcophagus and subsequent engraving depicted a bacchanalia, or scene of orgiastic carousal; the peculiar objects surroun...