Zeus' erotic escapades have been the subjects of artists' fascination for thousands of years. One such love adventure was Zeus' chase of Leda, the daughter of the Aetolian king Thestius who became the Spartan queen upon marrying the Spartan king Tyndareus. Leda was famed for her beauty; she had snow-white skin and luscious long black hair. It is easy to see why she caught the eye of the seducer-God Zeus who used the guise of a swan to ravish her. Leda lay with her husband the same night that Zeus ravished her and from those two unions she got four children, that is, two sets of twins - Castor and Pollux, and Helen and Clytemnestra. Her daughter Helen is the woman who infamously became the Helen of Troy. It is unclear which man is the father of which child.
Fig.1 Leda and the Swan. In the style of Pier Francesco Mola 17th century
Fig.2 Francois Boucher, Leda and Swan, 1744
Fig.3. Moreau, Leda and the Swan, 1882
Fig.4 Paul Cezanne, Leda and the Swan, 1880-82
Shameless Eroticism
The story of Zeus and Leda explores the themes of rape, power, transformation and vulnerability. Leda’s passive, graceful beauty and Zeus’ pursuit were common artistic motifs for Ancient Greek artists and they are often portrayed on vases, on frescoes and mosaics in Ancient Roman art, but it was during Renaissance that the ‘Leda and the Swan’ motif became all the rage for artists and their refined patrons of the art. European artists have always used the decoy of some mythological scene as an excuse to depict a naked woman; shameless eroticism wrapped in the disguise of mythology.
Fig.5 Gericault, Leda and the Swan, 1817.
Fig.6 Delacroix, Leda and the Swan, 1834
Fig.7 Jerzy Hulewicz. Leda and the Swan, 1928
Fig.8 RMalijan, Leda and the Swan, 2013
Ambivalent
In all of these depictions of Leda and the Swan, ranging from the Pompeii mosaic to Renaissance all the way to some contemporary artworks, it is interesting to notice the different ways that the dynamic between Leda and the swan is presented, and also the different ways in which Leda reacts to the advances of the swan. Sometimes she is scared and is pushing him away, as is the case for the painting at Fig.8, other times she is ambivalent.
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