Satyr

Satyrs were the companions of the wine god Bacchus, from whom they derived their goat-like features. Occupied only with pleasure and mischief, the grinning satyr is surrounded by symbols of fertility and abundance. He wears a garland of flowers on his head, and visible in the bottom right corner are a cornucopia of fruit and a syrinx—the reeded flute played by such mythical creatures.

Annibale executed this painting in the final years of the 1580s while still in his native Bologna. Its origins remain unknown, suggesting the possibility that the artist painted it as a studio exercise. At the art academy established by the three Carracci in 1582, students would have studied and reworked images of the male nude such as the Capodimonte Bacchus and Satyr.