{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O16435"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O16435/"}},"images":{"_primary_thumbnail":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2023NN7147/full/!100,100/0/default.jpg","_iiif_image":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2023NN7147/","_alt_iiif_image":[],"imageResolution":"high","_images_meta":[{"assetRef":"2023NN7147","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2006AG3149","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2017KA4519","copyright":"©Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2023NP6845","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false}]},"see_also":{"_iiif_pres":"https://iiif.vam.ac.uk/collections/O16435/manifest.json","_alt_iiif_pres":[]}},"record":{"systemNumber":"O16435","accessionNumber":"P.11-1934","objectType":"Watercolour","titles":[{"title":"Sappho","type":"assigned by artist"}],"summaryDescription":"This watercolour is part one of three scenes surrounding the suicide of Greek poetess, Sappho, a subject that Moreau frequently represented. It shows the Ancient poetess Sappho on the top of a cliff lamenting over the desertion of her lover, Phaon. The lyre, slung over her shoulder, is the traditionnal attribute of poets. As a precurser to Symbolism, Moreau sought inspiration from mythological, literary, and biblical references. ","physicalDescription":"Sappho rests on the promontory of Leucadia in an attitude of despair, wearing an elaborately patterned red and purple gown apparently based on kimonos in a Japanese print Moreau owned.  Her lyre is slung over her shoulder.  Seagulls circle overhead and the setting sun presages her impending suicide.   At left, a pillar surmounted by the griffon of Apollo further emphasises Sappho's status as a poet.","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"Moreau, Gustave","id":"A2303"},"association":{"text":"painter (artist)","id":"AAT25136"},"note":""}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[{"text":"watercolour (paint)","id":"AAT15045"}],"techniques":[{"text":"watercolour painting","id":"THES250889"}],"materialsAndTechniques":"Watercolour","categories":[{"text":"Gender and Sexuality","id":"THES48940"},{"text":"Watercolours","id":"THES277714"}],"styles":[{"text":"Symbolism","id":"x31277"}],"collectionCode":{"text":"PDP","id":"THES48595"},"images":["2023NN7147","2006AG3149","2017KA4519","2023NP6845"],"imageResolution":"high","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"LVLH","id":"THES49654"},"free":"","case":"WD","shelf":"41","box":"B"}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"watercolour (painting)","id":"AAT78925"}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"","note":""}],"placesOfOrigin":[{"place":{"text":"Paris","id":"x29068"},"association":{"text":"painted","id":"x30138"},"note":""}],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"1871-1872","earliest":"1871-01-01","latest":"1872-12-31"},"association":{"text":"painted","id":"x30138"},"note":""}],"associatedObjects":[{"object":{"text":"E.49-1968","id":"O124021"},"association":""}],"creditLine":"Given by Canon Gray in memory of André S. Raffalovich","dimensions":[{"dimension":"Height","value":"195","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"2024","earliest":"2024-01-01","latest":"2024-12-31"},"part":"image","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"136","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"2024","earliest":"2024-01-01","latest":"2024-12-31"},"part":"image","note":""},{"dimension":"Height","value":"234","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"2024","earliest":"2024-01-01","latest":"2024-12-31"},"part":"sheet","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"172","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"2024","earliest":"2024-01-01","latest":"2024-12-31"},"part":"sheet","note":""}],"dimensionsNote":"","marksAndInscriptions":[{"content":"'--Gustave Moreau--'","inscriber":{"name":{"text":"","id":""},"association":{"text":"","id":""}},"date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"description":"","interpretation":"","language":"","medium":"","method":"","position":"","script":"","translation":"","transliteration":"","type":"","note":"Signed in lower left corner"}],"objectHistory":"Moreau exhibited <i>Sappho</i> at the annual exhibition of the Cercle des Arts in March 1872 (which belies the prevailing notion that his work remained out of the public eye between the Salons of 1869 and 1876), where it caught the eye of Parisian salon hostess Marie Raffalovich.  She bought the watercolour from Moreau in June of the same year, thus beginning more than two decades of patronage.  Although Madame Raffalovich bought several other paintings by Moreau, a collection of letters she wrote to Moreau which are preserved in the Musée Gustave Moreau in Paris shows that <i>Sappho</i> remained her firm favourite -- she even wrote a fairy tale (never published) based on it.\r\n\r\nThe watercolour passed to her son, André, a poet, salon host and rival of Oscar Wilde in 1890s London, at an unknown date.  However, it was definitely in his possession by 1894, as a letter that year from Aubrey Beardsley mentions 'your beautiful Moreau'.  When he died, André left instructions for his companion, the poet and priest John Gray (the presumed model for Dorian Gray in <i>The Picture of Dorian Gray</i>) to donate it to the V&A.\n\nHistorical significance: This is one of the only works by Moreau in the national collections (along with <i>Costume design for a dancer</i>, also in the V&A, and <i>St George and the Dragon</i> in the National Gallery).","historicalContext":"This watercolour, with its rich, jewel-like colours is characteristic of Moreau’s later period. It shows the Ancient poetess Sappho on the top of a cliff lamenting over the desertion of her lover, Phaon. The lyre, slung over her shoulder, is the traditionnal attribute of poets. At left, a pillar surmounted by the griffon of Apollo, the Greco-Roman god of poetry, further emphasises Sappho's status as a poet.\n\r\nBoth Sappho’s vivid gown and her pose are taken from a Japanese woodcut by Utagawa Kunisada titled <i>Genji taking the air in summer on the Sumida</i>, which Moreau had purchased from E. Desoye’s gallery ‘Spécialités des objets du Japon’, the leading Japanese art dealer in Paris in the 1860s.\n\r\nSigned ‘Gustave Moreau’ the work titled <i>Sapph</i><i>o</i> by the artist was exhibited at the annual exhibition of the Cercle des Arts, which opened on the 20 January 1872. There  it caught the eye of Parisian salon hostess and great collector Marie Raffalovich. She bought the watercolour from Moreau in June of the same year, thus beginning more than two decades of patronage. Although Madame Raffalovich bought several other paintings by Moreau, it is known from her correpsondence with the artist that <i>Sappho</i> remained her firm favourite.\n\r\nThe watercolour passed to her son, André, a poet, salon host and rival of Oscar Wilde in 1890s London, at an unknown date. However, it was definitely in his possession by 1894, as a letter that year from Aubrey Beardsley mentions 'your beautiful Moreau'. When he died, André left instructions for his companion, the poet and priest John Gray (the presumed model for Dorian Gray in <i>The Picture of Dorian Gray</i>) to donate it to the V&amp;A.\n\r\nMoreau’s fastination with Sappho as  a subject began in 1849, after which he produced several cycles into the 1870s in both watercolour and oil. Sappho is part one of three distinct episodes depicting her death; the other two are entitled <i>Sappho flinging herself into the Sea</i> (in a private collection in Paris) and <i>Sappho lying at the foot of the Cliff</i> (formerly in the Esnault-Pelterie Collection; the smaller version now in the museum at Saint-Lo). \n\r\nThis is one of the only works by Moreau in a British national collection (along with <i>Costume design for a dancer</i> (E.49-1968), also in the V&amp;A, and <i>S</i><i>t George and the Dragon</i> in the National Gallery).\n\r\nA key work of the Symbolists was J K Huysmans' novel <i>A Rebours</i>, which contains an enthusiastic description of Moreau's exhibits in the Salon of 1876. Moreau's paintings were admired by Marcel Proust and by the Symbolists of the 1880s and 1890s, the group reacted against the fin-de-siècle realism in art. \r\n","briefDescription":"Watercolour, Sappho, by Gustave Moreau, 1871-2.\r","bibliographicReferences":[{"reference":{"text":"Stooss, Toni (ed.), <i>Gustave Moreau, Symboliste</i>, Kunsthaus Zurich, 1986","id":"AUTH356754"},"details":"pp.148-49","free":""},{"reference":{"text":"Jullian, Philippe, <i>French Symbolist Painters: Moreau, Puvis de Chavannes, Redon and their followers</i>, London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1972.","id":"AUTH348621"},"details":"","free":""},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"<u>Le Japonisme</u>, exh. cat., Paris, Grand Palais and Tokyo, Museum of Western Art, 1988, pp. 148-49."},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Pierre-Louis Mathieu, <u>Gustave Moreau. Monographie et nouvelle catalogue de l'oeuvre achevé</u>, Paris, 1998, p. 322."},{"reference":{"text":"Lacambre, Geneviève (ed.), <i>Gustave Moreau: between epic and dream</i>, Paris, Grand Palais, Chicago, Art Institute and New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1999","id":"AUTH356750"},"details":"pp.111-113","free":""},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Rachel Sloan, 'Gustave Moreau and the Raffalovich family: new documents on <i>Sappho</i>', <i>The Burlington Magazine</i> 148, May 2006."},{"reference":{"text":"Lacambre, Geneviève, <i>Gustave Moreau et le Symbolisme</i>, Kofu, Yamanashi Prefectural Museum of Art, 1984","id":"AUTH356752"},"details":"p.93","free":""},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"<u>100 Great Paintings in The Victoria & Albert Museum,</u> London, 1985, p.180"},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"P.172","free":"Margot Th. Brandlhuber and Michael Buhrs, eds. <u>In the temple of the self : the artist's residence as a total work of art : Europe und America 1800-1948</u>. Munich: Villa Stuck, 2013. ISBN:  9783775735933."},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"<u>Victoria & Albert Museum Department of Engraving, Illustration and Design & Department of Paintings Accessions 1934</u> London: Published under the Authority of the Board of Education, 1935"},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Salé, Marie-Pierre. Watercolor: A History, (trans. Alan Paddle), New York: Abbeville Press Publishers, 2020, p. 292, pl. 215."}],"production":"","productionType":{"text":"","id":""},"contentDescription":"","contentPlaces":[{"text":"Leucadia","id":"x39037"}],"associatedPlaces":[],"contentPerson":[{"text":"Sappho","id":"N542"}],"associatedPerson":[{"text":"Gray, John","id":"N4683"},{"text":"Raffalovich, Marc-André","id":"N4684"}],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[{"text":"poets","id":"AAT25513"}],"contentConcepts":[{"text":"suicide","id":"x39038"}],"contentLiteraryRefs":[],"galleryLabels":[{"text":"Gustave Moreau 1926-1897\r\nSappho\r\nProbably about 1884; signed\r\n\r\n\r\nMoreau was a French Symbolist painter. This work, inspired by an opera by Gounod, depicts the Greek poet Sappho. She committed suicide after being abandoned by her female lover. It belonged to John Gray, a homosexual poet who was said to be the inspiration for The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde.\r\n\r\nWatercolour on paper\r\n\r\nGiven by John Gray in memory of Andre Raffalovich 1934\r\nMuseum no. P.11-1934","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null}}],"partNumbers":["P.11-1934"],"accessionNumberNum":"11","accessionNumberPrefix":"P","accessionYear":1934,"otherNumbers":[],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":[],"recordModificationDate":"2026-05-12","recordCreationDate":"1999-12-15","availableToBook":false}}