If Virgil's Aeneid was the structure of Bernini's work, Ovid's Metamorphoses was the skin. And the difference between the two poets explains a central feature of Bernini's art that goes unnoticed by those who only look at the technique.
A morally ambiguous poet
The Metamorphoses is a radically different book from the Aeneid: where Virgil is solemn, epic and morally clear, Ovid is dizzying and ambiguous. The stories of transformation that he tells, across fifteen books and around 250 myths, do not necessarily end well, sometimes it is redemption, sometimes punishment, sometimes just the cosmos indifferent to human suffering.
The permission that Ovid gave to Bernini
Bernini relied on Ovid precisely for this ambiguity, something that no strictly Christian theme could offer in the same way: permission to show power without judging it, desire without domesticating it, transformation without explaining it completely. It's what makes sculptures like Apollo and Daphne and The Rape of Proserpina so uncomfortable and so enduring.
Transformation as the central theme of everything
The theme that runs through Metamorphoses, the idea that everything transforms and that the only constant is change, is also the central theme of all of Bernini's sculpture. He didn’t carve out the before or after of an event. It sculpted the during, the exact moment of change, the only material capable of capturing what time, by definition, cannot preserve.
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What is the relationship between Bernini and Ovid's Metamorphoses?
The Metamorphoses directly inspired two of Bernini's most famous sculptures, Apollo and Daphne and The Rape of Proserpina, but their influence goes beyond these specific works, shaping the central theme of all his sculpture, the instant of transformation.
Why was Ovid different from Virgil to Bernini?
Where Virgil is solemn and morally clear, Ovid is dizzying and morally ambiguous. His stories don't necessarily end well, and this ambiguity gave Bernini permission to show power and desire without judging them.
What is the central theme that Ovid and Bernini share?
The transformation. The Metamorphoses state that everything transforms and that the only constant is change; Bernini sculpted precisely the moment of transformation, not before or after, but during, something that only marble could capture.
Continue on the Bernini cluster: Who was Bernini? · Apollo and Daphne, by Bernini, and Ovid · The Abduction of Proserpina, by Bernini
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