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Luca Giordano, Italian, (1634-1705)
Bacchus and Ariadne, c. 1685-86
Oil on canvas, 48 x 69 inches
Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr.

Luca Giordano was the unrivaled leader of the Neapolitan school of painting during the second half of the 17th century. His Bacchus and Ariadne is among the most fluent paintings of his mature period, a decorative work radiating with the iridescent colors of the late Baroque. Its mythological subject is that of Ariadne, the daughter of King Minos of Crete, who, after helping her beloved Theseus escape the Labyrinth, was abandoned by him on the island of Naxos. Heartbroken, she was discovered on the shore by Bacchus, god of wine, who was instantly taken with her beauty.

In Giordano's painting, the love-smitten Bacchus is surrounded by his robust companions--maenads, satyrs, and putti--as he steals up on Ariadne slumbering sadly at the water's edge. Sparkling in the sky above her is her jeweled wedding crown, there as a foreshadowing of the couple's love and impending marriage. After they wed, Bacchus placed her crown in the heavens where it was transformed into the constellation seen here, the "corona borealis."

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