Achille and Pentesilea

Pacetti’s terracotta, representing Achilles and Penthesilea, won the Concorso Balestra prize in 1773. The theme of the competition, which was organised by Anton Raphael Mengs, was the death of Penthesilea. The artist has set the group on a dramatic rocky base, the protagonists’ pathos accentuated by the diagonal of Achilles’s arm as he struggles to hold up the lifeless body of Penthesilea, and by the hero’s mantle which, still swollen with wind, hints of the battle just ended