Bacchus and Ariadne
Eustache Le Sueur
(French, 1616–1655)
about 1640
Medium/TechniqueOil on canvas
Dimensions175.3 x 125.7 cm (69 x 49 1/2 in.)
Credit LineErnest Wadsworth Longfellow Fund and Grant Walker Fund
Accession number68.764
On View
On viewClassificationsPaintings
Collections
Ariadne, daughter of King Minos of Crete, helped the Greek hero Theseus escape from her father's infamous Labyrinth, but Theseus abandoned her soon after on the island of Naxos. She was rescued by Bacchus, god of wine, who is seen here rushing in from his ship. He honored her by flinging her crown up into the sky, where it became a constellation of stars. The figures in Le Sueur's paintings have a cool monumentality that suggests sculpture; the pose of Ariadne comes from ancient Roman sarcophagi, and that of Bacchus from the renowned classical statue, the Apollo Belvedere.
ProvenancePossibly Marie-Jeanne Bécu, Comtesse du Barry (b. 1746 - d. 1793), Paris; February 17, 1777, possibly in the du Barry sale, Paillet, Paris, lot 20 [see note 1]. 1789, Philippe-Louis Parizeau (b. 1740 - d. 1801), Paris; March 26, 1789, Parizeau sale, Paillet, Paris, lot 32, bought in; May 24, 1792, Parizeau sale, Hôtel de Bullion Paris, lot 63, bought in [see note 2]; March 11, 1793, Parizeau sale, Paris, lot 43. 1966, private collection; 1966, sold from this private collection, through an unknown intermediary, to Heim Gallery, Paris; 1968, sold by Heim to the MFA [see note 3]. (Accession Date: December 11, 1968)NOTES:
[1] Attributed to Simon Vouet. See Eric Zafran, French Paintings in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, vol. 1, Artists Born Before 1790 (Boston, 1998), p. 67, cat. no. 20.
[2] Alain Mérot, Eustache Le Sueur (1616-1655) (Paris: Arthena, 1987), p. 179, cat. no. 31.
[3] Accessioned as a work by Simon Vouet.
Louis Le Nain
Henri Eugène Augustin Le Sidaner
Master of Le Palazze
