Arnold Böcklin
1827-1901
Isle of the Dead
Athrpa Mirror ca. 320 B.C.
Iphigenia in Aulis, taken by Ulysses
and Achilles to Artemis
Agamemnon
sacrifices over
Achilles’ objection
Last play of
Euripides
Artemis consoles
Clytemnestra
House of Julia
Felix, Pompeii
• Ariadne is seen, in plate XLIII, just awaking after the fatal
sleep during which Theseus had deserted her. The ship
of her ungrateful paramour is seen in the distance. The
subject was much admired by the ancients, and the
figure of Ariadne is full of grace. The sea is represented
of a deep-blue colour which contrasts well with the
figures, and the sky almost mixes with the horizon. The
right hand of Ariadne is here in the favourite position of
the painter. Her hair is, as usual, auburn, and her robe is
rose-colour very prettily shaded. Xenophon, in the
Banquet of Socrates, insinuates that Bacchus and
Ariadne were favourite subjects for eating-rooms. In this
house we accordingly find a repetition in the chamber of
Leda.
Boscotrecase
• One of the most elaborate must have been the villa built
by Agrippa, close friend of the emperor Augustus and
husband of his daughter Julia. It stood overlooking the
Bay of Naples, near the modern Italian town of
Boscotrecase. Completely buried during the eruption of
Mount Vesuvius in 79 A.D., the villa was partially
excavated between 1903 and 1905, when wall
decorations in four bedrooms were removed. Agrippa
died in 12 B.C., and his son Agrippa Postumus became
the villa's proprietor in 11 B.C., as inscriptions found
there indicate; the frescos must have been completed
during renovations begun at that time.