Jean Dominique Ingres, “Jupiter and Thetis”, Oil on Canvas, 1811, Musee Granet
“Jupiter and Thetis” is an 1811 painting by the French neoclassical painter Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, located in the Musee Granet, Aix-en Provence, France. The work painted by the artist when he was 31, severely and pointedly, contrasts the grandeur and might of a cloud-born Olympian male deity against that of the diminutive nymph. Ingres’ subject matter is from an episode of Homer’s Illiad when Thetis begs Jupiter to intervene and guide the fate of her son Achilles.
The painting is steeped in the traditions of both classical and neoclassical art, most notably in its grand scale of 136 x 101 inches. Ingres creates many visual contrasts between the god and the slithering nymph: Jupiter is shown facing the viewer frontally with both his arms and legs spread broadly across the canvas, while the color of his dress and flesh echos that of the marble at his feet. In contrast, Thetis is rendered in sensuous curves and portrayed in supplication to the mercy of a cruel god who holds the fate of her son in his hands.
Ingres kept ‘Jupiter and Thetis’ in his studio until 1834, when it was purchased when it was purchased by the state. In 1848, he mad a pencil copy. The painting was first exhibited at the 1811 Paris Salon, at a time when Ingres’ attention to line coupled with his disregard for anatomical reality was yet to find favor among critics.