"PSYCHE REVIVED BY CUPID'S KISS " A SCULPTURE IN LOUVRE MUSEUM, PARIS"

                                                      

A VISIT TO LOUVRE MUSEUM PARIS: --"PSYCHE REVIVED BY CUPID'S KISS" by Antonio Canova … ( Lying in Room 403, Denon wing, Level 0 in Louvre )

 

"My friends. Ladies and Gentleman. I seek attention. We are at another wonder created in the world of art. Silence and listen attentively. If you didn't do "Cupid and Psyche" sculpture or painting, you were not a great artist or sculptor. That is what the world believed. So all great sculptors or great painters have done it. Rodin did it. There is a masterpiece on this topic done by Francois Gerard. It is in Sully Wing. We shall see that also. Let us focus on this great sculpture. This sculpture is based on the Greek love story of Cupid and the Psyche. Here is that moment. That great moment was sculpted by Canova. The awakening of Psyche from the infernal sleep. The awakening is not by the arrow but by the Kiss. A poetic representation. Poetry in sculpture. ". This is what the English-speaking guide told his group. I kept listening. I also came to know much more about this prominent sculpture on display in Louvre Museum.

This sculpture represents the God Cupid in the height of love and tenderness, immediately after awakening Psyche with a kiss. And Cupid bears some proximity to our Kamdeva, the god of love." Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss” was first done as a commissioned work by Antonio Canova in 1787 at the specific request of a British art collector and politician. The first version of this great sculpture finally landed in Louvre, France. In 1796, Canova did the second version that is currently lying in Hermitage Museum in Russia.

 

This sculpture exemplifies Antonio Canova’s amazing craftsmanship and skills in carving marble.  The figures of Cupid and Psyche (except the wings) are positioned in a pyramid shape, which creates a stable form for the sculpture. Cupid sits on one knee on top of a rock and holds Psyche. He has large wings pointing straight up into the air and wears his arrows in a quiver on his back. Having been awakened, Psyche reaches up toward her lover, Cupid, as he gently holds her by supporting her head and breast. Psyche reaches up to Cupid and has her hands on his head. She lets her head hang back and they are about to kiss. Her long hair reaches the ground. She has a cloth wrapped around her lower body. The detached draping around Psyche’s lower body, emphasizes the difference between the texture of skin and drapery. Beautiful curls and lines define the hair, and the feathery details create the realistic wings of Cupid. The rough stone texture provides the basis of the rock upon which the composition is placed.

Canova conducted extensive research to create this sculpture. The position of Cupid is copied exactly from a painting he saw in Herculaneum near Naples. After many sketches, he then created numerous clay figures of the sculpture. Unlike many other sculptors who created small-sized clay models for sculpture, Canova created the clay models at their real size. This helped him to accurately sculpt his work in marble.

 

The favourite student of Canova, Adamo Tadolino, inherited the plaster model for this sculpture, which is now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He used this model to create at least five known marble replicas of this sculpture with small modifications. He added, for example, small butterfly wings to the back of Psyche and created smaller wings for Cupid.

 

Antonio Canova ( born in Italy) is considered the greatest Neoclassical sculptor of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. He was credited with ushering in a new aesthetic of clear, regularized form and calm repose inspired by classical antiquities. Canova statues are not much different from those sculptures made in Classical Greece but with a certain air of romanticism and sensibility characteristic of his style. Among his patrons were Napoleon and his family, for whom Canova produced much work, including several depictions between 1803 and 1809. Although Canova's early works revealed the influence of Baroque theatrics in their dramatic subjects, agonized expressions, and twisting forms, in Rome, he was influenced by antiquarians, archaeologists, and patrons who promoted a more restrained aesthetic. He dominated the arts in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Internationally famous, he was regarded as the most brilliant sculptor in Europe.

 

( Avtar Mota)

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