Having been abandoned on the Greek island of Naxos, the mythological princess Ariadne was discovered by Bacchus, god of wine, who fell in love with her. In Dalou’s plaster she is tenderly awakened by the deity while a mischievous faun (a half-human, half-goat creature) attempts to distract the couple with an offering of grapes.

Aimé-Jules Dalou was a protégé of the sculptor Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux and spent his early years studying the art of the 18th century. His first success came with images of modern life, such as nursing mothers and infants, but he later undertook allegorical subjects and historical statues for public commissions in France’s Third Republic. This plaster was exhibited at the annual Paris Salon in 1892 and later used as the model for a marble version, now at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts.