The famous antique erotic sculpture, the Barberini Faun “… has acquired a reputation as an example of homoerotic art. Nudity in Greek art was nothing new; however, the blatant sexuality of this piece makes it most interesting … His wantonly spread legs focus attention on his genitals … Art and Popular Culture
Barberini Faun
By Smarthistory. Presented by Khan Academy, November 7, 2012
Barberini Faun, c. 220 B.C.E., Hellenistic Period (Glyptothek, Munich). Speakers: Dr. Beth Harris & Dr. Steven Zucker. Created by Beth Harris and Steven Zucker.
Source: Smarthistory. Presented by Khan Academy.
More on this antique erotic sculpture mystery from Art and Popular Culture
“Barberini Faun or Drunken Satyr is located in the Glyptothek in Munich, Germany. A Faun is the Roman equivalent of a Greek Satyr. In Greek mythology, satyrs were human-like male woodland spirits with several animal features, often a goat-like tail, hooves, ears, or horns. Satyrs attended Dionysus …
“The sculpture was either carved by an unknown Hellenistic sculptor of the Pergamene school, in the late third or early second century BCE. or is a Roman copy of high quality. The statue was found in the 1620s at the Castel Sant’Angelo, Rome, which in Antiquity had been Hadrian’s Mausoleum …
“The historian Procopius recorded that during the siege of Rome in 537 the defenders had hurled down upon the Goths the statues adorning Hadrian’s Mausoleum, and Johann Winckelmann speculated that the place of discovery and the statue’s condition suggested that it had been such a projectile.”
Also see: The Concealed Erotic Paintings of Sommonte (19th Century)
