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Date : near 1526
Material : Oil painting on wood
| Item 2 on 9
European Painting
Painting
Area related
Germany
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| Description |  |
The male faun sits on a rock, staff in hand, with a slain lion at his feet. He gazes toward a woman-presumably his wife-and their children.
Cranach's sophisticated treatment of mythological subjects derived from his highly original blending of native and classical literary sources. While the precise subject of this work remains tantalizingly obscure, the scene recalls the legendary "wild man" found in medieval literature, the idyllic forest dwellers (fauns, sylvans) described by the Greek poet Hesiod, and even Hercules' victory over the Nemean lion. The shaggy forest landscape separates the family from the viewer in place and time, and from civilization as represented by the fortified mountainscape. The delicate, enamel-like brushwork and complex subject appealed to the refined tastes of Cranach's learned patrons at the court of the Saxon electors in Wittenberg.
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