Collection Online as of May 28, 2023
Calliope, Muse of Epic Poetry
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Charles Meynier
(French, 1768–1832)
Oil on canvas
Overall: 275 x 177 cm (108 1/4 x 69 11/16 in.)
Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund 2003.6.4
Location
201 French Neoclassical Painting & Sculpture
Description
The eldest of the nine Greek muses, Calliope was the goddess of music, song, and dance. She was also known as the goddess of epic poetry and conferred the gift of eloquence on kings and princes. She stands here before a bust of Homer, the ancient Greek poet who wrote the Odyssey and the Iliad. This painting belongs to a cycle of five works commissioned by businessman François Boyer-Fonfréde for his home in Toulouse.
Charles Meynier
Charles Meynier was a recipient of the Grand Prix de Rome in 1789 and became a member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in 1815. A history painter, he created the grand decoration for ceilings of the Louvre (1819 and 1822), and produced numerous pictures glorifying the Napoleonic legend, which for the most part remain in the château de Versailles. Through the assistance of his brother Meynier Saint-Phal, a famous actor of the Comédie Française who paid for his studies, the artist entered the atelier of the painter François André Vincent (1746-1816), a principal rival of the master Jacques-Louis David. The studio in which Meynier received his training was known by the students of David as the atelier of the"perruques," (the wigs) the name given to royalists or conservatives during that period.