Claude Lorrain (Claude Gellée)
(1600-1682)

French

Landscape with Apollo and the Muses
1652

Oil on canvas

This is Claude's largest and most ambitious
landscape, painted in Rome for Cardinal
Pamphili (1619-1663). It evokes a mythical
world, as described by the poet Virgil. The
god Apollo, playing on his lyre, is seated
on Mount Helicon, surrounded by the nine
Muses, goddesses of music and poetry. Four
poets draw near to listen and to drink at the
Hippocrene fountain, the source of artistic
inspiration.

Purchased with the aid of the National Art Fund and a
Treasury Grant 1960 (NG 2240)

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