Artwork
The Odyssey
The Odyssey is an unspecified painting by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres. It dates from 1850 and is held in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts of Lyon.
About this work
Overview
Created in 1850, this oil painting by French academician Jean‑Auguste‑Dominique Ingres depicts a feminine embodiment of Homer’s epic poem, The Odyssey. The work is part of the collection of the Musée des Beaux‑Arts de Lyon, where it remains on display as a representative example of Ingres’s later mythological output.
Subject & Meaning
The central figure is an allegorical woman who personifies the narrative journey of Odysseus and his homecoming. By choosing a single, idealized female form, Ingres condenses the poem’s complex themes of adventure, longing, and return into a visual symbol of the epic’s enduring resonance.
Technique & Style
Executed in Ingres’s characteristic linear precision, the composition emphasizes smooth contours and a restrained palette. The figure’s drapery is rendered with meticulous attention to the play of light, reflecting the artist’s neoclassical training while hinting at the emerging Romantic interest in literary subjects.
History & Provenance
After its completion, the canvas entered the French art market before being acquired by the Museum of Fine Arts in Lyon. The museum’s acquisition records indicate the painting has been part of its permanent collection since the late 19th century, where it has been catalogued among Ingres’s mythological series.
Artist & collection
Artist
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres was a French Neoclassical painter. Ingres was profoundly influenced by past artistic traditions and aspired to become the guardian of academic orthodoxy against the ascendant Romantic…
Sappho on the Leucadian Cliff
Thoughtful Woman's Head
Allegory of art
Alcyone's Farewell to her Husband. From Ovid's Metamorphoses, Song XI
Clio, Muse of History
Figure of a Woman
Lecția de pictură
Ariadne Abandoned by Theseus
The Farewell of Telemachus and Eucharis
Italia
Portrait of girl with a crown
Woman of the "Orient"