Aeneas Rescuing Anchises from Burning Troy

Discussion

FROM THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO’S CATALOG

Anchises, former lover of the goddess Aphrodite, is here shown as an old man asleep in bed. In the background at right, seemingly disconnected from the quiet bedchamber, his home city of Troy burns. In this rendition of the Classical story, Hendrick van Steenwijck drops the viewer into a moment of suspended action as Anchises’s demigod son, Trojan hero Aeneas, rushes in to save his father and carry him to safety. Throughout, Steenwijck emphasizes contrasts between father and son: age and youth, light and dark, peace and chaos. The crisp and detailed depiction of the room itself attests to Steenwijck’s expertise in painting architectural interiors, a specialty he shared with his artist wife, Susanna van Steenwijck.

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