A few weeks ago I toured the galleria at Villa Borghese with my Baroque art history class. We visited the museum twice, with one lecture devoted to paintings and the other to statues. The paintings were incredible, but the statues were my favorite (again). They were exquisite. This lecture only solidified my love for the art form.
My two favorites were both sculpted by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, the name that most exemplifies Baroque art. These pictures are not my own, as both the museum and Paolo forbid photography.
The first statue is called Pluto and Persephone, or The Rape of Persephone, inspired by the myth of the same name in Ovid's Metamorphoses. The young goddess Persephone who is kidnapped by the god of the underworld, Pluto, who had fallen in love with her as he watched her pick flowers in Sicily. The tale is a dramatic one, as Pluto opens a giant chasm in the earth, grabs Persephone and takes her back into his underworld to make her his queen. Bernini captures this horrifying moment in his sculpture, with the surprised and distraught Persephone hoisted onto the shoulder of the strong and fearsome Pluto.
But with a closer look, the statue is more than just moment of the myth. It involves the viewer in that moment, as though we are an onlooker watching the abduction happen before our very eyes.
The three headed dog sitting is Cerberus, the guard dog of Pluto. Cerberus' heads each look in a different direction, and denote the placement of the statue in the story. The one on the left is hard to see, as it is cowering behind the body of Pluto. This head is shielding it's eyes from the light and warmth of Sicily, which the group faces. The head in the middle has it's head craned upward and it's mouth open, displaying it's teeth with a menacing bark. The head on the right looks behind the group, back towards it's dark underworld home. The position of the heads in the statue mirror the placement of the statue in the Galleria Borghese as well as in the story. The statue faces large windows and a door that look out onto the gardens of Villa Borghese which are supposed to signify the beautiful meadows of Sicily, where Persephone had been picking her flowers. Behind the statue are the rooms of the rest of the Villa which would have been in darkness, much like the underworld where Pluto takes Persephone. We know this to be true because Bernini sculpted the statue for this exact spot in Villa Borghese. In this incredible way, Bernini engages our senses with his statue. With the dogs' direction we can see the sun and beautiful flowers of Sicily, as well as the darkness of Hades. We can also hear the dog's barking if we really imagine it.
However amazing this is, Bernini does not stop there. His statue is exceptionally carved; the muscles of Pluto are defined and rigid, and Bernini achieves the difficult task of depicting Pluto's backward movement as he steps behind himself toward Hades. His face is determined with a furrowed brow and smoldering eyes. Contrastingly, Persephone's body is soft and curvy, expressing the nature of her youth and innocence. Her arms are thrown up in protest of her kidnapping and her face is tortured with the alarm of the moment captured. Bernini even sculpted a tiny tear in her eye to show the grief that is to come.
But the cherry on top of it all is the hand of Pluto that grasps the thigh of Persephone. With a closer look, one can see the indentations of his hand as though they are truly grasping the real flesh and muscle of the young goddess's leg, making the figures appear more lifelike than they already are. I wish there was a way that you all could see it in person, but here is a picture up close. It is a statue truly remarkable to behold.
Also, just a fun little fact for you, Bernini finished this statue when he was 22 years old...what????? I'm dead.
The second statue that left me dumbfounded was Bernini's Apollo and Daphne. This is another statue inspired by a myth from Ovid's Metamorphoses. This myth tells the tale of Apollo's unrequited love for Daphne which, through his misery poetry is born. Cupid, the conniving god of love, was angered by a joke Apollo had made at his expense. In an act of revenge, he shot Apollo with an arrow of love and Daphne, a beautiful nymph, with an arrow of hate. Upon seeing Daphne, Apollo was immediately enraptured while Daphne was filled with loathing. Apollo tried to convince her of his love, but Daphne would not stay to listen. Below is the rest of the story in full.
So ran the god and girl, one swift in hope,
The other in terror, but he ran more swiftly,
borne on the wings of love, gave her no rest,
Shadowed her shoulder, breathed on her streaming hair.
Her strength was gone, worn out by the long effort
Of the long flight; she was deathly pale, and seeing
The river of her father, cried "O help me,
If there is any power in the rivers,
Change and destroy the body which has given
Too much delight!" And hardly had she finished,
When her limbs grew numb and heavy, her soft breasts
Were closed with delicate bark, her hair was leaves,
Her arms were branches, and her speedy feet 550
Rooted and held, and her head became a tree top,
Everything gone except her grace, her shining.
Apollo loved her still. He placed his hand
Where he had hoped and felt the heart still beating
Under the bark; and he embraced the branches
As if they still were limbs, and kissed the wood,
And the wood shrank from his kisses, and the god
Exclaimed: "Since you can never be my bride,
My tree at least you shall be! Let the laurel
Adorn, henceforth, my hair, my lyre, my quiver;
Let Roman victors, in the long procession,
Wear laurel wreaths for triumph and ovation.
Beside Augustus' portals let the laurel
Guard and watch over the oak, and as my head
Is always youthful, let the laurel always
Be green and shining!" He said no more. The laurel,
Stirring, seemed to consent, to be saying "Yes."
Again the sculpting of Bernini is flawless. Shocker.
Bernini chooses to sculpt another pivotal moment, fraught with awe and apprehension. Daphne is in the midst of her transformation into the laurel tree. She is breathless from the chase; somehow Bernini has made her face paler than the rest of her body. Upon it flashes a look of shock and almost doubt, at whether she has made a mistake in her hasty request. Meanwhile, her fingers are turning into leaves, her flowing hair into branches, and her toes are growing roots. A rough bark envelopes her young body. Apollo, sculpted in the act of the chase, looks for Daphne in the distance. He believes he has caught her as he lays his hand on her waist, but touches the trunk of a tree instead of her soft skin. You can almost see the look of surprise that is about to cross his face as he feels the beat of her heart beneath the bark, drumming after the long run. All of this would be enough to shock and awe any audience with his talent, but Bernini continues to raise the bar.
Again, Bernini incorporates his audience into his sculpture. If we walk around the statue in a counterclockwise direction beginning from the bottom right corner and ending in the bottom left corner, we see the story unfold before our very eyes. From the first angle we see a boy chasing a girl. When we get to the top right corner, the transformation of Daphne is now visible to us; we see her fingers beginning to sprout leaves and her feet growing into roots. In the top left corner, we can see the transformation is farther along as her torso becomes the trunk and her human features are disappearing. Finally, at the bottom left corner, we now see a boy chasing a tree.
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Looking at this statue and listening to what Paolo read the section I posted above, I felt like I was a witness in the very same forest, perhaps hiding behind a neighboring tree. Paolo told us that these were the movies of that time, and he was right. It's not hard to imagine the heavy breathing of the couple as they ran through the forest, or the sound of their feet hitting the forest floor. Looking at Apollo's left hand, I can imagine what the rugged bark of Daphne's new skin must have felt like. And I don't have to imagine seeing her transformation; I can see it all happen just by walking around Bernini's work. What is most astonishing to me is how the statue made me feel the emotion of Apollo as he finally reaches his love and finds instead a tree. I can feel his disappointment, his despair, and his longing. And this is all produced by a chiseled piece of stone, albeit a brilliantly chiseled piece of stone. There is no contemporary art in the entire world that can even come close to this. Bernini was 25 when this was completed.
My experience at Galleria Borghese - or at any other museum/monument I have seen, for that matter - would not have been the same had it not been for my awe-inspiring professor, Paolo Alei. With each lecture, he continues to astound me. His knowledge of art knows no bounds, and our class has probably not even scratched the surface of the it. But Paolo's intelligence is not what impresses me most. There are many geniuses in our world, but few choose to become teachers and even fewer are actually talented ones. Paolo opens my eyes to things no audio guide or book could ever offer. With each class, I learn and appreciate so much more about art, and Rome. He is a captivating lecturer and although intimidating, humble and passionate about his profession. He's even got me thinking of taking a minor in art history once I get back to Santa Cruz. He's that good.
