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Hercules and Atlas
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In classical mythology, the hero Hercules performed twelve labors to obtain immortality. Here Michel Anguier depicted an episode from the eleventh, for which Hercules sought help from Atlas, bearer of the sky, whose weight Hercules temporarily lifted in exchange for Atlas’s help. Anguier cast the pair as muscular giants in a corkscrewing vertical composition: Hercules, standing, adjusts his cloak, returning the weight of the heavens to Atlas. In 1669, Anguier submitted a large terracotta of this composition, now in the collection of the Musée du Louvre, Paris, to the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture as his reception piece, one of the requirements for admission. This is the only known bronze cast from that model.
- Artist
- Michel Anguier
- Title
- Hercules and Atlas
- Date
- ca. 1668
- Place of Creation
- France
- Object Type
- Sculpture
- Medium
- Bronze
- Dimensions
- 32 1/2 x 22 1/2 x 24 in. (82.6 x 57.2 x 61 cm)
- Credit Line
- Museum purchase, William H. Noble Bequest Fund
- Accession Number
- 1980.5