Jupiter and Thetis

Enthroned among the clouds on Mount Olympus, Jupiter sits in monumental frontality, his massive form radiating sovereign power. At his feet, the sea nymph Thetis presses against him in a sinuous, supplicant pose, her right hand resting on his hip with a suggestion of erotic intimacy while her left reaches up to touch his beard in the ancient gesture of entreaty. She begs the king of the gods to intervene in the Trojan War on behalf of her son Achilles, a scene drawn from the first book of Homer's Iliad.

Ingres painted this monumental canvas while still a student at the French Academy in Rome, fulfilling his obligations as a Prix de Rome laureate. The composition of Jupiter derives from ancient descriptions of the lost chryselephantine statue of Zeus at Olympia by Phidias, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The stark contrast between the god's marmoreal stillness and Thetis's boneless, almost liquid flexibility demonstrates Ingres's willingness to distort anatomy in the service of expressive line.

When the painting debuted at the 1811 Paris Salon, critics were slow to appreciate its unconventional linear emphasis. The work languished in Ingres's studio for over two decades before the French state acquired it in 1834. It now hangs in the Musee Granet in Aix-en-Provence.