Name of Object:

Apollo and Daphne

Location:

Rome, Latium, Italy

Holding Museum:

Borghese Gallery

 About Borghese Gallery, Rome

Original Owner:

Cardinal Scipione Borghese

Current Owner:

Italian State

Date of Object:

1622–1625

Artist(s) / Craftsperson(s):

Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598, Naples-1680, Rome)

Museum Inventory Number:

CV

Material(s) / Technique(s):

Marble

Dimensions:

h: 243 cm

Provenance:

Borghese Collection

Type of object:

Sculpture

Description:

This sculpture is considered one of the masterpieces in the history of art.
Bernini began sculpting it in 1622 after he finished The Rape of Proserpina. He stopped working on it from 1623 to 1624 to sculpt David, before completing it in 1625.
With notable technical accuracy, the natural agility of this work shows the astonishing moment when the nymph turns into a laurel tree. The artist uses his exceptional technical skill to turn the marble into roots, leaves and windswept hair. Psychological research, combined with typically Baroque expressiveness, renders the emotion of Daphne's terror, caught by the god in her desperate journey, still ignorant of her ongoing transformation. Apollo, thinking he has achieved his objective, is caught in the moment he becomes aware of the metamorphosis, before he is able to react, watching astonished as his victim turns into a laurel tree. For Apollo's head, Bernini looked to Apollo Belvedere, which was in the Vatican at the time.
The base includes two scrolls, the first containing the lines of the distich by Maffeo Barberini, a friend of Cardinal Scipione Borghese and future Pope Urban VIII. It explores the theme of vanitas in beauty and pleasure, rendered as a Christian moralisation of a profane theme. The second scroll was added in the mid-1700s.
The group, like others created by Bernini in the Villa, was backed on to a wall, setting a mandatory point of view for the visitor entering the room, to fulfil the pictorial objectives and provide the surprising scenery, key components of the baroque style. As with other sculptures, it was placed in the centre of the room during the renovations of 1700. Bernini worked with the sculptor Giuliano Finelli, who provided the delicate detailing on the base, rocks and part of the leaves and tree.

Bernini executed the group between 1622 and 1625. Such a pagan myth (by Ovid in Metamorphosis) in the cardinal's house is explained by a moral distich by Maffeo Barberini (Urbano VIII, 1623–1644) on the theme of vanitas “those who love to pursue fleeting forms of pleasure, in the end find only leaves and bitter berries in their hands.”

How Object was obtained:

The Borghese Collection was acquired by the Italian State in 1902.

Selected bibliography:

Faldi, I., Galleria Borghese. Le sculture dal secolo XVI al secolo XIX, Rome, 1954, n.35, pp. 34–37.
Wittkower, R., Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The Sculptor of the Roman Baroque, London, 1955 (edition Italiana Milano, 1990, cat. 18, pp. 13–15).
Coliva, A., “Apollo e Dafne”, in Bernini Scultore, La nascita del Barocco in Casa Borghese, exhibition catalogue, Rome, 1998, pp. 252–275.
Ulivi, M., Sorrentino, M. A., Chilosi, M. G., Rockwell P., “Apollo e Dafne” in Bernini scultore e la tecnica esecutiva, Rome, 2002, pp. 184–207.

Additional Copyright Information:

Copyright image: Archivio fotografico Soprintendenza Speciale PSAE e Polo Museale della Città di Roma.

Citation of this web page:

Sofia Barchiesi, Maria Assunta  Sorrentino "Apollo and Daphne" in "Discover Baroque Art", Museum With No Frontiers, 2025.
https://baroqueart.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=object;BAR;it;Mus11;6;en

Prepared by: Sofia BarchiesiSofia Barchiesi

SURNAME: Barchiesi
NAME: Sofia

TITLE: Author and Researcher

CV:
Sofia Barchiesi, a graduate and specialist in Art History and recipient of a scholarship from the School of Mediaeval and Modern Art History at Lumsa University, has been working with the Superintendency for Historical Artistic Heritage and the Museums of Rome since the late 1980s. She was responsible for cataloguing the art of the region and museums of Rome, studying the period of the Counter-Reformation particularly closely. She works with journals and writes essays, alternating her research and teaching work., Maria Assunta SorrentinoMaria Assunta Sorrentino

SURNAME: Sorrentino
NAME: Maria Assunta

AFFILIATION: Borghese Gallery, Rome

TITLE: Conservation Department Co-ordinator

CV:
Maria Assunta Sorrentino, holder a of a Diploma in Painting and Fresco Restoration and a degree in the Science of Cultural Heritage (historical-artistic), has worked at the Borghese Gallery since 1993, where she manages the Conservation Department and is in charge of the technical and organisational co-ordination of temporary exhibitions. She is currently working on the Ten Great Exhibitions project underway at the Borghese Gallery. She has published several papers on conservation and history in relation to the exhibition, with particular reference to artists such as Bernini, Domenichino, Canova and Caravaggio.
Translation by: Laurence Nunny
Translation copyedited by: Mandi GomezMandi Gomez

Amanda Gomez is a freelance copy-editor and proofreader working in London. She studied Art History and Literature at Essex University (1986–89) and received her MA (Area Studies Africa: Art, Literature, African Thought) from SOAS in 1990. She worked as an editorial assistant for the independent publisher Bellew Publishing (1991–94) and studied at Bookhouse and the London College of Printing on day release. She was publications officer at the Museum of London until 2000 and then took a role at Art Books International, where she worked on projects for independent publishers and arts institutions that included MWNF’s English-language editions of the books series Islamic Art in the Mediterranean. She was part of the editorial team for further MWNF iterations: Discover Islamic Art in the Mediterranean Virtual Museum and the illustrated volume Discover Islamic Art in the Mediterranean.

True to its ethos of connecting people through the arts, MWNF has provided Amanda with valuable opportunities for discovery and learning, increased her editorial experience, and connected her with publishers and institutions all over the world. More recently, the projects she has worked on include MWNF’s Sharing History Virtual Museum and Exhibition series, Vitra Design Museum’s Victor Papanek and Objects of Desire, and Haus der Kulturen der Welt’s online publication 2 or 3 Tigers and its volume Race, Nation, Class.

MWNF Working Number: IT1 08