Collection Online as of December 5, 2023

Flora and Zephyrus (from Set of Ovid's Metamorphoses)

1704–1731

Part of a set. See all set records

manufacturer

Gobelins Manufactory

(France, Paris, est. 1662)

France, 18th century

Tapestry weave

Overall: 324.5 x 295 cm (127 3/4 x 116 1/8 in.)

Gift of Mrs. Matthias Plum 1956.325.2

Location

not on view

Fun Fact

During the French Revolution, Gobelins tapestries were sometimes disassembled to harvest the gold threads.

Description

In an abundant garden of trees and flowers, the goddess Flora sits beneath a vase of luscious flowers as her husband, the west wind Zephyrus, carried by a white cloud, reaches out to crown her with a floral chaplet. In this tapestry, Zephyrus’s wings resemble those of a butterfly or moth rather than a bird. The ravishing landscape echoes Flora and Zephyrus as springtime divinities. The parrot in the foreground is a colorful intermediary between the viewer and the gods represented in this tapestry.

Gobelins Manufactory

For more information: http://www.oxfordartonline.com/groveart/view/10.1093/gao/9781884446054.001.0001/oao-9781884446054-e-7000032919

Provenance

?–1956

Mrs. Matthias Plum (Bertha Andrews Rainey Plum) [1909-1976], New York, NY, gifted to the Cleveland Museum of Art

1956–

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Citations

Malloy, Katherine R. “Three Eighteenth-Century Gobelins Tapestries.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 44, no. 2 (1957): 24–27. Mentioned: P. 25-27 www.jstor.org

Standen, Edith A. “Ovid’s ‘Metamorphoses’: A Gobelins Tapestry Series.” Metropolitan Museum Journal 23 (1988): 149–191. Mentioned: P. 171-173, 188; Reproduced: P. 172, fig. 30 www.jstor.org