Feste de Bacchus (Festival of Bacchus from, Bacchannales or the Quatre Festes)

Description

Claude Gillot’s four-etching series of riotous woodland bacchanals celebrates Bacchus, Pan, fauns, and the nymph Diana (see 1969.279–81). As stylistic precursors to the French Rococo with a deep interest in theater, Gillot’s prints are satirical and revolve around ancient sculpture. The young Bacchus appears here as the devotional focal point, his head atop a herm (a stone pillar topped with a carved head or bust, sometimes with a phallus) festooned with flowers and fruit. The bas-relief hanging above shows the god discovering his future wife, Ariadne, while the text below teasingly suggests that enough wine will solve all romantic problems.

Feste de Bacchus (Festival of Bacchus from, Bacchannales or the Quatre Festes)

Claude Gillot

c.1693-1722

Accession Number

31681

Medium

Etching on paper

Dimensions

Image: 17.3 × 35.7 cm (6 13/16 × 14 1/16 in.); Plate: 22 × 37.2 cm (8 11/16 × 14 11/16 in.); Sheet: 30.5 × 46 cm (12 1/16 × 18 1/8 in.)

Classification

etching

Museum

The Art Institute of Chicago

Chicago, United States

Credit Line

Potter Palmer Collection Fund