{
"data": {
"id": 150022,
"accession_number": "1980.238",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "Arion on a Sea Horse and Bacchante on a Panther (pair), 1855. William Adolphe Bouguereau (French, 1825\u20131905). Oil on fabric; framed: 87.3 x 127 x 5.4 cm (34 3/8 x 50 x 2 1/8 in.); unframed: 71.3 x 111.8 cm (28 1/16 x 44 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Bequest of Noah L. Butkin, 1980.238",
"current_location": "201 Neoclassical Painting & Sculpture",
"title": "Arion on a Sea Horse and Bacchante on a Panther (pair)",
"creation_date": "1855",
"creation_date_earliest": 1855,
"creation_date_latest": 1855,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"France, 19th century"
],
"technique": "oil on fabric",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Modern European Painting and Sculpture",
"collection": "Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960",
"type": "Painting",
"measurements": "Framed: 87.3 x 127 x 5.4 cm (34 3/8 x 50 x 2 1/8 in.); Unframed: 71.3 x 111.8 cm (28 1/16 x 44 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"framed": {
"height": 0.873,
"height_inch": 34,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.375,
"width": 1.27,
"width_inch": 50,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.0,
"depth": 0.054,
"depth_inch": 2,
"depth_inch_fraction": 0.125
},
"unframed": {
"height": 0.713,
"height_inch": 28,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.0625,
"width": 1.118,
"width_inch": 44,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.0
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "Signed lower right: wb [in monogram] / 1855\r\n",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 304521,
"title": "Year in Review: 1980",
"description": "Year in Review: 1980. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (June 24-July 19, 1981).",
"opening_date": "1981-06-24T04:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": []
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "Commissioned by Anatole Bartholoni, Paris. Paris sale, Drouot, 27 April 1933 (lot 32), Arion chevauchant un monstre marin (lot 33), Bacchante sur une panth\u00e8re (repr.), Shepherd Gallery, New York, 1972. Christopher Gibbs Ltd., London, 1973. London sale, Sotheby's, 30 November 1977 (lot 208), Arion sur un dauphin; Bacchante sur une panth\u00e8re (repr.), \u00a36500. Noah L. Butkin, Cleveland. Bequeathed to the CMA in 1980.",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": null,
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "These paintings are from a series of eight works that Bouguereau painted for a Parisian home decorated in the style inspired by ancient Roman wall paintings found at Pompeii. The ancient Greek poet Arion escaped pirates by fleeing on the back of a sea creature attracted by the poet's singing. In the companion picture, a bacchante, a female follower of the Roman god Bacchus, rides a panther and carries a pinecone-tipped spear called a thyrsus. The figures are silhouetted against a gold honeycomb\u2013patterned background evoking ancient Roman mosaics Bouguereau had studied in Italy. The soft, waxy flesh tones and glimmering gold leaf were calculated to come to life when viewed under the mansion's gas lighting.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60474448"
],
"internet_archive": [
"https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1980.238-arion-on-a-sea-horse"
]
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Weeda, Eddy, Joop Schamine\u0301e and Nils van Rooijen. Botanische meesterwerken: bij het 170-jarig bestaan van de Koninklijke Nederlandse Botanische Vereniging. 2016.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Jullian, Philippe. \"The Symbolists.\" Architectural Digest 31 (January/February 1975): 58-63.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: P. 59",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Lee, Sherman E. \u201cThe Year in Review for 1980.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 68, no. 6 (June 1981): 163\u2013219.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: P. 182, 211, nos. 27 & 28",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25159730"
},
{
"citation": "Wissman, Fronia E. Bouguereau. San Francisco: Pomegranate Artbooks, 1996.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 22-24, pls. 4 & 5",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Argencourt, Louise d', and Roger Diederen. Catalogue of Paintings. Pt. 4. European Paintings of the 19th Century. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1974.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 76-79, Vol. I, cat. nos. 29, 30",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Bartoli, Damien, and Frederick C. Ross. William Bouguereau. Woodbridge Suffolk: Antique Collectors' Club in cooperation with the Art Renewal Center, 2010.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: Vol. II, p. 41, nos. 1855/03A, 1855/03B",
"url": ""
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/1980.238",
"images": {
"annotation": null,
"web": {
"url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1980.238/1980.238_web.jpg",
"width": "707",
"height": "900",
"filesize": "289548",
"filename": "1980.238_web.jpg"
},
"print": {
"url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1980.238/1980.238_print.jpg",
"width": "2669",
"height": "3400",
"filesize": "2633825",
"filename": "1980.238_print.jpg"
},
"full": {
"url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1980.238/1980.238_full.tif",
"width": "6310",
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},
"alternate_images": [],
"creditline": "Bequest of Noah L. Butkin",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": "Sarah S. and Alexander M. Cutler Gallery",
"athena_id": 150022,
"creators": [
{
"id": 1571,
"description": "William Adolphe Bouguereau (French, 1825\u20131905)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": "William Adolphe Bouguereau started drawing at an early age but did not take lessons until 1834, his first year in college in Pons, where his instructor was Louis Sage, who had been a pupil of Ingres (q.v.). In 1841 Bouguereau's father, a wine merchant, moved the family to Bordeaux. The following year he was allowed to attend the \u00c9cole Municipale de Dessin et de Peinture, where he studied under Jean-Paul Alaux. Bouguereau became a bookkeeper for another wine merchant in order to meet the cost of the school. By 1844 he had won the first prize for figure painting, which further encouraged him to pursue his art career. He lived with his uncle in Mortagne from 1845 until 1846, painted portraits of the local landowners, and saved enough money to move to Paris. In 1846 he entered the \u00c9cole des Beaux-Arts and studied under Fran\u00e7ois-\u00c9douard Picot (1786-1868). After several attempts, he finally won the Premier Grand Prix de Rome in 1850. He lived at the Villa Medici in Rome and studied Raphael, Andrea del Sarto, Giotto's Paduan frescos, and those at San Francesco in Assisi. The impact of these works appeared in Bouguereau's oeuvre in the form of classical poses, restraint, and a high degree of finish. After his return to France, Bouguereau exhibited regularly at the Salon, concentrating on classical, genre, and religious themes. In 1858 he was commissioned to decorate his first public building-the Chapel of St. Louis in St. Clotilde Church in Paris. Other public commissions followed, including the chapels of St. Pierre-Paul and St. Jean-Baptiste at St. Augustin Church in Paris, the cupola decorations in the cathedral in La Rochelle, and the ceiling of the Grand Theater of Bordeaux. Bouguereau remained in France during the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71), fighting in the National Guard. Afterward he taught at the Acad\u00e9mie Julian in Paris. In 1876 he fulfilled a lifelong goal, being elected to the Acad\u00e9mie des Beaux-Arts de l'Institut de France. He received the Legion of Honor in 1878 and was a professor at the \u00c9cole des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 1888. Bouguereau's support of the academy and his interest in classicism caused a fall in his popularity at the end of his life. Nevertheless, he died a successful, wealthy artist.",
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1825",
"death_year": "1905",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "1980-12-19T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1855,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "1855",
"collapse_artists": false,
"on_loan": false,
"recently_acquired": false,
"record_type": "cover",
"conservation_statement": null,
"has_conservation_images": false,
"cover_accession_number": null,
"is_nazi_era_provenance": false,
"impression": null,
"alternate_titles": [],
"is_highlight": false,
"updated_at": "2026-05-29 07:44:29.393000"
}
}