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  Home>Plan Your Visit>Tours, Guides, and Maps>Self-Guided Tours>Audio Stop 205
      

      
      Search Audio Stop 205 Select LanguageEnglishChineseKoreanSpanishJapanese
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 A nearly nude, muscular man with pale, peachy skin sits in an underground cave among seven male and two female lions in this horizontal painting. The man sits to our right of center with his legs crossed, elbows close to his body with hands clasped by his chest. His head tips back to look up through a small opening above. He has long, wavy, chestnut-brown hair and dark eyes. A white cloth wraps across his hips, and he sits on a scarlet-red swath of fabric draped up over a rock next to him. The nine lions stalk, sit, or lie down around the man. One male lion next to the man, to our left, opens his mouth with his head thrown back, curling tongue extended beyond long fangs. A human skull and other bones are strewn on the dirt ground close to us. The rocky cave curves up around the animals and man to a narrow, round opening showing blue sky above.
 Sir Peter Paul Rubens *Daniel in the Lions' Den*, c. 1614/1616 Cray Saffoe, curador de grandes felinos en el Zoológico Nacional, examina la representación de los leones de Rubens en un momento cúlmine de dramatismo.
 Transcripción de audioNARRADOR: 
Con la mirada fija hacia arriba y las manos apretadas en una plegaria, Daniel, el héroe bíblico, suplica a Dios que lo salve. El rey de Babilonia, enfadado con la negativa de Daniel de adorarlo, lo ha arrojado a una guarida de leones, donde espera que los fieros felinos lo despedacen. El artista flamenco Peter Paul Rubens retrató con destreza a los leones.
CRAIG SAFFOE: 
Todo lo anatómico de estos leones se ve bastante acertado para mí. Mi nombre es Craig Saffoe, soy el curador de grandes felinos en el Zoológico Nacional Smithsoniano.  
NARRADOR: 
Rubens realizó este cuadro alrededor de 1616. Pudo estudiar a leones reales en la colección real de animales de Bruselas. Fíjense en el par de leones que están abajo y a la derecha. 
CRAIG SAFFOE: 
Gruñen y se exhiben los dientes el uno al otro: algo muy normal entre leones.  No siempre es una señal de abierta agresión, puede que estén peleando por los trozos de huesos que vemos en el suelo. 
 
De hecho, veo un rango completo de expresiones felinas. Si era lo que el artista intentaba capturar, lo hizo con belleza. El animal que bosteza al fondo es grandioso. Y luego está el que está justo debajo de él, con una mirada pensativa como si viera algo que está cazando, y el de abajo de todo, que está completamente dormido. 
Es cierto que estos felinos evocan emociones, una de ellas es el hombre contra la bestia salvaje. 
NARRADOR: 
Aquí vemos a Daniel en un momento de supervivencia: su fe inquebrantable en Dios le sirve de protección contra la muerte prematura en la cueva de los leones.
La habilidad de Rubens y su fascinación con el mundo que lo rodeaba, tan evidente en la representación de esos leones, le brindó un éxito enorme como artista y recibió el patrocinio de la realeza de toda Europa. Visita guiada del Edificio Oeste: Selección destacada
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