Hebe and the Eagle of Jupiter

Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Modeled c. 1852, cast c. 1860/80

François Rude (French, 1784–1855)

Toward the end of his career, François Rude’s native city of Dijon, France, commissioned him to create a marble sculpture. For its subject, Rude chose the Greek goddess of youth, Hebe, whom he depicted as cupbearer to the gods, raising a vessel of the divine beverage ambrosia above her father, Zeus, in the guise of an eagle. Rude made the model for the marble statue in 1852 but did not live to finish the work, which was completed by his nephew. This bronze is a smaller version of the marble, and the existence of many other similar casts indicate the work’s popularity.

Status: Currently Off View
Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Artist: François Rude
Title: Hebe and the Eagle of Jupiter
Place: France (Artist's nationality:)
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.: Modeled 1847–1857
Medium: Bronze
Inscriptions: Signed: Rude (on base, front left); stamped: Thiebaut Freres, Fondeurs, Paris (in script, right side)
Dimensions: 78.7 × 52.4 cm (31 × 20 5/8 in.)
Credit Line: Purchased with funds provided by Mr. and Mrs. John H. Leslie
Reference Number: 1975.306
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/48844/manifest.json

Paris, Palais des Champs-Élysées, Explication des ouvrages de peinture, sculpture, gravure, lithographie et architecture des artistes vivants (1857), p. 397, no. 3095.
Alexis Bertrand, Les Artistes célèbres: François Rude (Paris: Librairie de l’art, 1888), pp. 96, 99–100.
Joseph Calmette, François Rude (Paris: H. Floury, 1920), pp. 152-57.
Dijon, Musée des Beaux-Arts, François Rude, 1784-1855: Commémoration du Centenaire (1955), pp. 28–29, nos. 35, 37, pl. 16.
Stanislas Lami, Dictionnaire des sculpteurs de l’école française au dix–neuvième siècle 4, reprint (Nendeln, Liechtenstein: Kraus, 1970), pp. 206, 215.
Robert Kashey and Martin L. H. Reymert, Western European Bronzes of the Nineteenth Century: A Survey (New York: Shepherd Gallery Associates, 1973), no. 9.
Jeremy Cooper, Nineteenth-Century Romantic Bronzes: French, English and American Bronzes, 1830-1915 (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1975), pp. 16-19, 27.
Art Institute of Chicago, “French Sculpture,” Art Institute of Chicago Annual Report 1974–75 (Chicago, 1976), p. 53.

Heim Gallery, London, by 1975; sold to the Art Institute, 1975.

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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.

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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.