Mirror

2nd century

Roman

Artemis (the Roman Diana), or a Roman lady with divine fantasies, after her bath in a rustic, woodland setting, is the subject of the tondo in relief on the back of this Roman hand mirror. Her cloak is draped over the rocks on which she sits, and she holds the end wrapped around a small hand mirror in her raised left hand, a divine celebration of the uses of the mirror in a Roman household. The landscape in front of her, to the right, recalls the paintings and reliefs from houses around the Bay of Naples before the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in A.D. 79. The quiver of the goddess leans against the base of a garlanded altar with a small herm on top. A second terminal figure, Priapis, the god of gardens and fertility, tilts back while facing to the right on the ledge at the right. The bovine skull in the right foreground suggests the sacrifice after a successful hunt.

Status: On View, Gallery 152
Department: Arts of the Ancient Mediterranean and Byzantium

Culture: Ancient Roman
Title: Mirror
Place: Roman Empire (Object made in)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 101 CE–200 CE
Medium: Reflective disk: bronze; repoussé disk: brass
Dimensions: 0.9 × 11.8 cm (3/8 × 4 11/16 in.)
Credit Line: James W. and Marilynn Alsdorf Collection
Reference Number: 1985.1042a-b
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/104999/manifest.json

Wilhelm Hornbostel, Aus Gräbern und Heiligtümern: Die Antikensammlung Walter Kropatscheck, exh. cat. (Mainz: Zabern, 1980), p. 273 (ill.).
Art Institute of Chicago, Annual Report 1985–86 (Art Institute of Chicago, 1986), pp. 72, 103, fig. 54.
Dietrich Willers, “Vom Etruskischen zum Römischen Noch einmal zu einem Spiegelrelief in Malibu,” J. Paul Getty Museum Journal 14 (1986), p. 31, no. 58 (art market).
Karen B. Alexander and Mary Greuel. Private Taste in Ancient Rome: Selections from Chicago Collections. Exh. cat. (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1990), cat. 24.
Cornelius C. Vermeule III, “Ancient Art at the Art Institute of Chicago.” Special issue,Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies 20, no. 1 (1994): pp. 73–74, cat. 52 (ill.).
Karen B. Alexander, “From Plaster to Stone: Ancient Art at the Art Institute of Chicago,” in Karen Manchester, Recasting the Past: Collecting and Presenting Antiquities at the Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), p. 33.
Sandra E. Knudsen, “Cat. 144 Mirror: Curatorial Entry,” in Roman Art at the Art Institute of Chicago (Art Institute of Chicago, 2016).
John Twilley, “Cat. 144 Mirror: Technical Report,” in Roman Art at the Art Institute of Chicago (Art Institute of Chicago, 2016).

Art Institute of Chicago, Private Taste in Ancient Rome: Selections from Chicago Collections, March 3–September 16, 1990, cat. 24.
Art Institute of Chicago, Of Gods and Glamour: The Mary and Michael Jaharis Galleries of Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Art, Gallery 152, November 11, 2012 - May 16, 2018.

Formerly Hamburg Art Market [Hornbostel 1980]; Mathias Komor (1909-1984), New York, NY, acquired from a private art dealer in Hamburg before 1985 [according to acquisition records in curatorial file]. James W. (1913-1990) and Marilynn (1925-2019) Alsdorf, Chicago, IL, given to the Art Institute of Chicago, December 1985.

Cat. 144 Mirror, 2nd century A.D.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.