Penelope at Her Loom, 1764

This painting shows Penelope, a character from Homer’s epic ancient Greek poem The Odyssey. It was painted by the Swiss-Austrian artist Angelica Kauffman (1741-1807), one of the most famous European painters in the 18th century.

Looming fate

Why the sad face?

Penelope’s face and posture are mournful, and you can see tears in her eyes.

Her husband Odysseus, the legendary Greek king of Ithaca, had left to fight in the Trojan War. Penelope, who had just given birth to their son Telemachus, waited patiently for 20 years for his return.

After several years, many suitors began to appear, wanting to marry Penelope, but she remained faithful to her missing husband.

Weaving her story

Penelope sits at a large loom, weaving a shroud. To keep her suitors at bay, she claimed she could not marry again until she had finished weaving the funeral shroud for Odysseus’ ageing father Laertes.

Each night she carefully unravelled what she had been weaving during the day, thus never finishing the shroud and avoiding having to remarry. The loom became a symbol of Penelope’s agency and cleverness.

Heavy clothing

The shroud on the loom appears wafer-thin. By contrast, Penelope wears a garment made from heavy fabrics.

This is not what you would expect from a classical Greek figure, but these thick, gold and blue textiles reflect her status as a queen.

The heavy clothing also weighs her down visually, and she appears tied to this claustrophobic space. This is in stark contrast to the open sky in the background and her husband being lost in the open sea or in foreign lands.

Sad dog

This is Odysseus’ dog Argos, who was young and strong when his master left for Troy. Here he is a symbol of both Odysseus’ absence and presence. He reflects Penelope’s sadness, but like her he is holding out hope.

When Odysseus finally returns, Argos, by then weak and old, recognises him immediately, despite Odysseus wearing a disguise.

A bow

Like the dog, this bow also belongs to Odysseus.

When he returns after 20 years he does so in disguise, in order to test Penelope’s faithfulness. When required to prove his identity, he is the only one of Penelope’s suitors who can string this bow.

In this painting, the bow also elegantly points at Kauffman’s elaborate signature in the bottom left corner: ‘Angelica Kauffmann/… Roma 1764’.

Author: Alexandra Loske, Royal Pavilion Curator

 

3 comments

  1. The smaller pictures on this page are visible and the information interesting. However the larger painting of the whole picture is not visible, just a black square. The same happens with other paintings in this series. I would think this is because it uses too many pixels for my browser (google) to open.

    That’s a shame. Perhaps in future the paintings could be reduced so that we can all see them?

    1. Hello Sue,

      Thanks for letting me know about this. The black square is where the web page should be loading in a zoomable hi-res version of the image. I am aware that a small number of users with Chrome are experiencing a problem with the page not showing, but as I haven’t been able to replicate it I’m still working on a fix.

      In the meantime, viewing the page with another browser like Firefox, Safari, or Edge should work.

      Best,

      Kevin

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