The Dream of Paris

1536

Monogrammist PG (Germany, active c. 1525–50)

Faced with choosing the fairest goddess among Minerva, Juno, and Venus, the Trojan prince Paris picked Venus, shown here holding a heart and the golden apple given as a prize in the contest, with her son Cupid frolicking at her feet. Paris wears the garb of a contemporary knight rather than classical dress, a choice that emphasizes the enduring relevance of his moral crossroads as well as, through contrast, the nudity of the goddesses. His sleeping pose and the painting’s inscription, PARIS / TRA(U)M (“dream of Paris,” on the slip of paper attached to the tree), indicate that he is in the midst of a dream vision, a poetic device carried over from medieval allegory and used to foreshadow future events in a narrative. Here, these include the departure of Paris and Helen by boat in the middle distance, the catalyst for the Trojan War.

Status: On View, Gallery 207
Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Artist: Monogrammist PG
Title: The Dream of Paris
Place: Germany (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.: 1495–1550
Medium: Oil on panel
Inscriptions: Inscribed on paper attached to central tree trunk: PARIS / TRAM; in ligature on central tree trunk: 1 O.W. / 1536 / PG (or GP)
Dimensions: 49.1 × 32.8 cm (19 5/16 × 12 7/8 in.); Framed: 72.4 × 47.4 × 9.6 cm (28 1/2 × 18 5/8 × 3 3/4 in.)
Credit Line: Charles H. and Mary F. S. Worcester Collection
Reference Number: 1940.935
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/58702/manifest.json

“Early German Exhibition at Kleinberger’s,” Art News 27, 6 (1928), p. 5.
Frank Jewett Mather, Jr., “An Exhibition of German Primi-tives,” Arts 14 (1928), pp. 311–12.
Frank E. Washburn Freund, “Ausstellung altdeutscher Malerei in den F. Kleinberger Galleries zu New York,” Belvedere 8 (1929), p. 285.
Hertha Wescher-Kauert, “Zu den malerischen Anfängen des Matthias Gerung,” Zeitschrift für bildende Kunst 63 (1929–30), pp. 150–53 (ill.).
The Art Institute of Chicago, A Guide to the Paintings in the Permanent Collection, 1932, p. 193, no. 1104.28.
Charles L. Kuhn, A Catalogue of German Paintings of the Middle Ages and Renaissance in American Collections, Cambridge, Mass., 1936, p. 57, no. 215.
Daniel Catton Rich, ed., Catalogue of the Charles H. and Mary F. S. Worcester Collection of Paintings, Sculpture and Drawings, Chicago, 1938, pp. 43–44, no. 40, pl. 29.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Paintings in The Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Picture Collection, 1961, p. 177.
Mikhail Iakovlevich Libman, Zhivopis i risunok Ger-manii i Avstrii XV–XIX vekov, exh. cat., Moscow, [Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts], 1963, p. 28, under no. 602.
[Kurt Löcher], “Staatsgalerie Stuttgart: Neuerwerbungen 1967,” Jahrbuch der staatlichen Kunstsummlungen in Baden-Württemberg 5 (1968), p. 202.
John Maxon, The Art Institute of Chicago, London, 1970, pp. 254 (ill.), 282.
Dieter Koepplin and Tilman Falk, Lukas Cranach: Gemälde, Zeichnungen, Druckgraphik, vol. 2, exh. cat., Kunstmuseum Basel, 1976, p. 532, under no. 381.
Inge El-Himoud-Sperlich, “Das Urteil des Paris: Studien zur Bildtradi-tion des Themas im 16. Jahrhundert,” Ph.D. diss., Ludwig Max-milians Universität, Munich, 1977, p. 165.
Olga V. Postnikova, “Kartina Mattiasa Gerunga ‘Alle-goria liobvi’ iz sobrania GMII imeni A. S. Puszkina,” Soobshche-nia Gosudarstvennogo muzeia izobrazitelnykh iskusstv imeni A. S. Puszkina 9 (1992), p. 106.
Anja-Franziska Eichler, Mathis Gerung (um 1500–1570): Die Gemälde, Frankfurt, 1993, pp. 138, 141–51, 182–83, no. 11, fig. 79.
Fritz Grosse, “Thronbaldachine bei Ottheinrich von der Pfalz,” in Pfalzgraf Ottheinrich: Politik, Kunst und Wissenschaft im 16. Jahrhundert, Regensburg, 2002, pp. 210, 224–25, 285 (ill.).
Martha Wolff in Martha Wolff et al., Northern European and Spanish Paintings before 1600 in the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, 2008, pp. 404-7, ill.

New York, Kleinberger, Loan Exhibition of German Primitives for the Benefit of the American Red Cross, 1928, no. 51, as Georg Pentz [sic].
Art Institute of Chicago, Loan Exhibition of Old Masters, 1928–29 (no cat.).
Art Institute of Chicago, A Century of Progress, 1934, no. 14, as attributed to Matthias Gerung.

Dr. Reuling, Baltimore, 1902 [according to the catalogue of the Stillwell sale]. Dr. John E. Stillwell, New York, by 1927; sold, American Art Association, Anderson Galleries, New York, Dec. 1–3, 1927, no. 454, as Georg Pentz [sic], to Kleinberger for $4,750 [according to Charles Worcester’s annotation on the back of a photo in the curatorial file]. Kleinberger, New York and Paris, 1927–Oct. 1928; sold to Charles H. Worcester, Chicago, 1928 [invoice dated Oct. 13, 1928, Art Institute Archives; copy in curatorial file]; on loan to the AIC from 1928; given to the AIC, 1940.

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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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