The Good Samaritan
Gustave Moreau (French, 1826–1898)
c. 1865–70
Medium
watercolor, gouache, and graphite on paper
Dimensions
21 × 29.4 cm
Classification
Drawing
Department
Drawings
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund
Accession Number
2024.32
Tags
male
About this artwork
Gustave Moreau was distinctive within Symbolism—a movement focused on imagination and interiority—for the fact that he realized relatively traditional subjects often drawn from mythology and religion. Here, Moreau depicts a scene from the Good Samaritan, a story from the Bible’s New Testament about a wounded traveler who is helped by a passerby, despite the ideological and religious differences between the two. Moreau presents the narrative’s most poignant moment, showing the Samaritan giving up...