Apollon 1819 - 1880

Constantin Hansen made this small oil on canvas, Apollon, sometime in the 19th century. Hansen has depicted the Greek god of music nude, playing the lyre. The depiction of nude figures like Apollon was a common practice in academic art of the 1800s, which looked to classical antiquity for its ideals of beauty and harmony. Artists would often study ancient sculptures and artworks, and they would use these as models for their own works. Art academies reinforced this classical turn, and students would spend hours drawing and painting from plaster casts of ancient statues. Hansen was a Danish painter who studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, so he no doubt would have participated in this process. His choice of subject reflects the values of the art institutions of his time. It reveals how artists looked to the past to create something new, while upholding established artistic norms. To fully understand this work, one can research the influence of classical art on 19th-century academic painting, examining the training and values that shaped artists' creative choices.