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Leda and the Swan
Leda and the Swan

Leda and the Swan

ArtistFollower of Sodoma (Giovanni Antonio Bazzi) b. 1477, Vercelli; d. 1549, Siena
Datecirca 1512–1517
MediumOil on panel
Dimensions22 5/8 x 14 1/2 in. (57.5 x 36.8 cm)
Frame: 30 5/8 x 22 3/4 x 4 1/2 in. (77.8 x 57.8 x 11.4 cm)
ClassificationsPaintings
Credit LineGift of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation
Object numberGL.60.17.32
On View
Not on view
Label Text
Leda, a princess seduced by Zeus in the guise of a swan, appears with the two sets of twins born from her unions with Zeus and with her earthly husband, Tyndareos: Helen and Pollux, Castor and Clytemnestra. The four babies are depicted emerging from eggs. The composition derives from a celebrated lost work by Leonardo da Vinci known only from the master's drawings and from paintings by his followers, such as the one illustrated here.ProvenanceCount Alessandro Contini Bonacossi, Florence; Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York, 1936; on loan to the National Gallery of Art, by 1941- ca. 1960; gift of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation to the NCMA, 1961.Published ReferencesPreliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture (exhibition catalogue) (Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art,1 941), cat. no. 345.

The Samuel H. Kress Collection (Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1960), 72, illus. (b-w) 73 (as by Sodoma).

Emporium 134, no. 802 (October 1961), 174, illus.

"Acquisitions," North Carolina Museum of Art Bulletin 4, nos. 2 and 3 (Winter-Spring 1964), listed 56.

Fern Rusk Shapley, Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools XV - XVI Century, Vol. 2 (London: The Phaidon Press, 1968), 145, illus. fig. 352 .

Enzo Carli, Il Sodoma (Vercelli, Italy: Cassa di Risparmio di Vercelli, 1979), cat. no. 72, illus. fig. 72.

Elena Rossoni, Il Bianco e Dolce Cigno: Metafore d’amore nell’arte italiana del XVI secolo (Nuoro, Italy: Ilisso, 2002), mentioned 40, illus. (color) 41, fig. 53.

Exhibition HistoryWashington, DC, Smithsonian Institution, National Gallery of Art, "Preliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture," 1941, cat. no. 345.

Raleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, "A Gift to North Carolina: Italian Paintings and Sculpture from the Kress Collection," February 5-April 24, handout no. 12.
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