Sculpture
The Sleeping Faun
Sculpture
Details
- Author / creator
- Harriet Goodhue Hosmer (American, 1830–1908)
- Object type
- Sculpture
- Date or period
- modeled 1864, carved c. 1870
- Dimensions summary
- Overall: 127 cm
- Primary material
- Marble
- Place of origin
- United States
- Acquisition method
- Purchase
- Credit line
- Purchased with the Art Fund grant and Friends of the Ashcombe Museum, 1997
- Image rights
- Public domain (CC0)
About this object
Hosmer is the best known female member of a large group of American artists working in Italy during the mid-1800s. The Sleeping Faun, a depiction of a pointed-eared woodland spirit, demonstrates her mastery of the neoclassical style, which was inspired by the art of ancient Greece and Rome. Hosmer’s playful sense of humor infuses the composition: a half-human, half-goat satyr mischievously ties the unwitting faun’s animal skin garment to a tree stump.
Materials and technique
Marble
Signature and marks
Signed and inscribed on base: "H HOSMER Fecit -- Romae"; titled on base: "THE SLEEPING FAUN"
