Paintings with mythological scenes - Bacchus and Ariadne

The two paintings come from the Archinti collection in Milan and arrive at the Castelvecchio Museum in 1937. These works are part of a group of room paintings, often made in pairs, characterized by a narrative vein that takes its cue from mythological tales. They are linked by the common allegorical meaning of love that comes during sleep and complement each other in the compositional symmetry, in the thematic choice, in the gestures of the figures, as well as in the pictorial and stylistic quality.

In the first scene Arianna lies abandoned on the seashore, while in the background we see the ship of the fugitive Theseus. But Bacchus has arrived, with his procession of satyrs, and Love points to him the figure of the sleeping princess, lifting the blue mantle that covers her and acts as a background to a nude of delicate luminous shades.