03 — ARTWORK
Juno and Argus
- MEDIUM
- Oil on canvas, 140 x 138 cm
- TYPE
- Mythological
PALETTE
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- FILE
- 926 × 900 px · JPEG
COMMENTARY
UNDERLINED TERMS ARE DEFINED IN THE GLOSSARY.
The subject of the painting is taken from Ovid's Metamorphoses. Io, the beautiful daughter of the river god Inachus, fell prey to the passionThe events leading up to Good Friday, beginning with Christ's arrest and ending with his burial. Portrayals of the Passion, which focus on the Suffering Christ, include depictions of Judas betraying Christ with a kiss, Peter cutting off Malchus's ear, the crown of thorns, and so on. of Jupiter, who - in order to hide her from his jealous wife - turned the girl into a cow. The wily Juno talked her husband into giving her the fine-looking animal and had the hundred-eyed Argus guard it. Jupiter gave Mercury the task of killing the wicked guard. The inventive god approached the meadows and played songs on his pipe. The guard was charmed by the new and masterful melodies, and was lulled to sleep. Mercury beheads the sleeping guardian.
The vigour of the composition arranged on a diagonal, the lightness of the figure of Juno, recumbent on a cloud, and of her wind-blown draperies, the contrast of their bright, vivid colours with the muted tones of the rest of the picture, are characteristic of the artist's manner, which foreshadows eighteenth-century RococoA style of design, painting, and architecture dominating the 18th century, often considered the last stage of the Baroque. Developing in the Paris townhouses of the French aristocracy at the turn of the 18th century, Rococo was elegant and ornately decorative, its mood lighthearted and witty. Louis XV furniture, richly decorated with organic forms, is a typical product. Leading exponents of the Rococo sryle included the French painters Antoine Watteau (1684-1721) and Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1732-1806), and the German architect Johann Balthasar Neumann (1687-1753). Rococo gave way to Neo-classicism. art.
CITE THIS RECORD — BIBTEX
@online{wga-r54725965b151de,
author = {Krén, Emil and Marx, Daniel},
title = {Juno and Argus by FERRARI, Gregorio de},
organization = {{Web Gallery of Art}},
date = {2026-09-09},
url = {https://beta.wga.hu/artists/ferrari-gregorio-de-rfadef48d249421/juno-and-argus-r54725965b151de},
urldate = {2026-09-09},
langid = {english}
}ACCESSED 2026-09-09. REPLACE THE AUTHOR FIELD WITH THE COMMENTARY AUTHOR WHERE ONE IS NAMED.
