The masterpiece of Bernini's Medusa from Rome to San Francisco

Do not miss the extraordinary exhibition, from November 17, 2011 to February 19, 2012, of the Bernini’s Medusa at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco. The Musei Capitolini in Rome are lending San Francisco one of their greatest treasures, the remarkable Baroque masterpiece “The Medusa” by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, one of art history’s finest sculptors and a leading figure in Italian Baroque art and architecture.

For those who do not know the story, Medusa is a monster of Greek mythology, the daughter of Phorcys and Ceto. She was one of the Gorgons. In all of the oldest representations, she was horrible but in more recent versions (Ovid), Medusa was considered a beautiful woman who was able to charm men, who could not restrain themselves from turning around and looking at her, wich transformed them into stone. In the myth told by Ovid, the beautiful blonde hair of Medusa is transformed by Minerva into a horrible snake as punishment for having sex with Neptune in the temple of the goddesses of Faith and Truth.

The classical myth is reversed to magnify the power of the sculptor: it is not the Gorgon to petrify her enemies with his eyes, but in a fatal mistake she looked into a mirror, turning into marble.
Considered by critics one of the most problematic works by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, “The Medusa” was probably built in the early years of the pontificate of Pope Innocent X Pamphili, between 1644 and 1648, when the artist was removed from the papal court and his fame was temporarily obscured by the professional humiliation suffered after the demolition of the bell tower of the Basilica of San Pietro (1646), which he built.

In the Bust of Medusa, Bernini created an unprecedented iconography and original interpretation of the myth. Medusa, with the face of a classic beauty and soft outlines, looks into an imaginary mirror, her reflection caught in the moment when she realized that she was transforming into marble: the wriggling snakes are paralyzed in her hair and her expression of pain and anguish is forever fixed in stone.

The Medusa will be displayed exclusively in the U.S. at the Legion of Honor in the museum’s Baroque gallery 6, where it can be seen in context with the Museums’ great collections of paintings and sculpture from the era of Bernini. This loan is made possible by Sovraintendenza ai Beni Culturali di Roma Capitale — Musei Capitolini. George and Judy Marcus are the exclusive sponsors of the exhibition.

Valentina Calabrese
Contributor