Mosaic depicting a Cupid riding a pair of hippocamps
Place made:Italy
Culture: Roman
Date: 1961-1964, after a Roman mosaic of ca. A.D. 205
Medium: Stone tesserae in mortar
Dimensions:
41 15/16 x 80 7/8 in. (106.5 x 205.5 cm)
Credit Line: San Antonio Museum of Art, gift of Gilbert M. Denman, Jr.
Object number: 91.80.92
Provenance: Sold by Alfredo Turchi, Il Faunetto, Rome, to Gilbert M. Denman, Jr. (1921-2004), San Antonio, 1964; Gilbert M. Denman, Jr., by gift to the San Antonio Museum of Art, 1991
Label Text
Excavations at Ostia, a port city of ancient Rome at the mouth of the Tiber River, between 1938 and 1942 revealed many black and white mosaics that drew international attention. When a dealer in Rome offered this mosaic to Gilbert Denman in 1964, he claimed that it had been found near the site. In fact, this mosaic is a modern forgery that copies, at reduced scale and with the image reversed, part of a much larger pavement from public baths in Ostia known today as the Baths of the Seven Sages. The modern mosaicist probably worked from photographs published by the baths’ excavator, Giovanni Becatti, in 1961. (J. Powers, 2021)
Not on view
In Collection(s)
The San Antonio Museum of Art is in the process of digitizing its permanent collection. This electronic record was created from historic documentation that does not necessarily reflect SAMA's complete or current knowledge about the object. Review and updating of such records is ongoing.
This resource has been made possible in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities: Exploring the Human Endeavor.
