The painting was commissioned by Sir John Aird, 1st Baronet for £4,000 in 1888. In his notes to the Augustan History, Thayer notes that "Nero did this also (Suetonius, Nero, xxxi), and a similar ceiling in the house of Trimalchio is described in Petronius, Sat., lx." (Satyricon). Although the Latin refers to "violets and other flowers", Alma-Tadema depicts Elagabalus smothering his unsuspecting guests with rose petals released from a false ceiling. The painting depicts a (probably invented) episode in the life of the Roman emperor Elagabalus, also known as Heliogabalus (204–222), taken from the Augustan History. A woman plays the double pipes beside a marble pillar in the background, wearing the leopard skin of a maenad, with a bronze statue of Dionysus, based on the Ludovisi Dionysus, in front of a view of distant hills. The Roman emperor Elagabalus reclines on a platform behind them, wearing a golden robe and a tiara, watching the spectacle with other garlanded guests. It shows a group of Roman diners at a banquet, being swamped by drifts of pink rose petals falling from a false ceiling above. The Roses of Heliogabalus is an 1888 painting by the Anglo-Dutch artist Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema depicting the young Roman emperor Elagabalus hosting a banquet.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |