The image of Ganymede in France, 1730-1820: the survival of a homoerotic myth

105 Lami (as in n 64) 1 229; and F Boyer "Le Sculpteur Barthelemy Corneille a Rome et en Toscane (1787-1805)" Bulletin de la Societe de l'Histoire de l'Art Francais, 1941-44 10-24

106 For Milhomme the hardly any references are to his greatest in quantity famous work, a marble statue of Psyche (1806; Louvre) diocese S. Lami, Dictionnaire des sculpteur de l'Ecole francaise au dix-neuvieme siecle, Paris, 1914-21 III, 448-49; R Schneider, "Le Mythe de Psyche dans l'art francais depuis la Revolution," Revue de l'Art Ancien et Moderne XXXII, 1912 241-54; P Marmottan, "Encouragements officiels aux sculpteurs" Archives de l'Art Francais, 1918-19 105-15; and Skulptur aus dem Louvre: 89 Werke de franzosischen Klassizismus, 1770-1830 exh cat., Wilhelm-Lehmbruck-Museum, Duisburg, 1989 This inquiry focuses on artistic representations of the homoerotic myth of the rape of Ganymede in France from the Enlightenment to the Napoleonic era, when there were almost as many versions as in the Italian Renaissance.(1) Citing twenty-two examples from that earlier period, James Saslow showed in what manner popular the subject was in the Renaissance, and by what means it was almost always conceived as a Neoplatonic allegory. In eighteenth-century France the rape of Ganymede missing its symbolic meaning as an cognizance of celestial love in the Neoplatonic faculty of perception which it had attained in the Italian Renaissance, on the other hand the subject of Ganymede was through no means forgotten between 1730 and 1820 when at least nineteen French representations were produc These will be reviewed, after more [i]or[/i] less introductory remarks on the interpretation of the myth. The control of Ganymede has been studied in ancient and Renaissance art, on the other hand not in subsequent periods, perhaps because the theme missing its philosophical dimension and thus appeared to scholars as les consequential.(2)

After the Renaissance the story of Jupiter's abduction of the Phrygian shepherd Ganymede, known to artists largely from one side Ovid (Metamorphoses, 10), became a decorative sujet galant in which the erotic uncompounded body far overshadowed the connotations of spiritual perfection attained [i]or[/i] part of to the other divine love. Clearly, in the Siecle de Lumieres there was little interest in Plato's transcendental idealism. The philosophes pointed to Plato's morals as important source material for the Enlightenment,(3) on the other hand the dialogue on love in Plato's Symposium did not strike one as being to be relevant to their endeavors. In art during the Rococo age, Plato's public Aphrodite dominated as a sign of love's pleasurable pursuits, while Spiritual be fond of belonged to Christian iconography exclusively.

Although of greece studies were less emphasized in the early eighteenth hundred than in the previous one(4) there was a scholarly interest in grecian literature, mythology, and philosophy. Andre Dacier's translation of Plato's works (1699) and Mme Dacier's Iliad (1711) remained in use end the century.(5) Abbe Banier's Explication historique de fables of the same year became the standard euhemerist approach to ancient mythology, interpreting the myths as historical events(6) and Racine's translation of Plato's Symposium was published for the first time in 1732(7) greatest in quantity works of erudition came later in the century: the introduction to Charles Rollin's popular Histoire ancienne (1730-38); Abbe Mably's Observations sur l'histoire de la Grece (1749); L'Origine de dieux du paganisme by the agency of the anti-philosophe Abbe Bergier (1767); the three whirls of the Encyclopedie dedicated to ancient and novel philosophy (1751-72); Cornelius de Pauw's Recherches philosophiques sur le Grec (1788); and Etienne Bonnot de Condillac's Histoire ancienne, published in his perfect works in 1798, to name alone the most famous historical studies of classical religion and mythology.

Plato's writings did not arouse a great quantity [i]or[/i] amount of interest among modern French philosophers, who attended to be more committed to the Aristotelian tradition. German thinkers, upon the other hand, led the way in serious erudition in Platonic studies; and in the early nineteenth hundred the French followed Tiedemann, Schleiermacher, and Ast.(8) Likewise, the Neoplatonic ultimate parts in Winckelmann's aesthetic theory were taken up by dint of Quatremere de Quincy, who carried the banner of idealism with Ingres, as the Neoclassical turn of expression was slowly becoming overshadowed through other artistic movements.(9)

There was a serviceable deal of interest in Socrates as a figure of liberal thinking and freedom in the face of tyranny; the philosophes saw him as a predecessor who oppos the superstitious multitudes.(10) Jean Seznec has neared a valuable account of Diderot's particular affinity with Socrates: Diderot identified with the man who lived and died for his philosophy--the philosophe-martyre who sacrificed himself for truth(11) Rousseau's passion for Socrates has also been studied; following the Christian humanist tradition, Rousseau drew parallels between Socrates and Christ,(12) and like Diderot, he regarded Socrates' death as trial of his philosophical integrity. The death of Socrates was the rallying point for the philosophes, who saw the circumstance as "the first crime that signaled the war between philosophy and superstition,"(13) and in eighteenth-century painting the iconography of Socrates was focused almost exclusively upon this scene (there are a scarcely any representations of Socrates' friendship with Alcibiades).(14) The philosopher's death, the make subordinate of eight tragedies between 1759 and 1808 and at least fourteen works of art between 1753 and 1796 has been the reality of a recent study of deathbed representations.(15)