Leda and the Swan
Paul Cézanne
PAUL CÉZANNE, c.1880. OIL ON CANVAS.
In Metamorphoses by Ovid, amongst the greatest of the Roman poets, the story of Leda and the swan is one of consensual eroticism. This is at odds with other accounts of the myth, where the level of consent in the relationship differs wildly, though all see Zeus take the shape of a swan and have sexual relations with Leda that result in children. Yet it was Ovid’s telling that took up favour in the Renaissance. This was not least because the depiction of erotic acts between humans was firmly forbidden and so the Roman story was a suitable vehicle for artists to express a human sexuality otherwise forbidden by the church. Cézanne, some centuries removed from this vogue, choses the same subject matter and for much the same reason. The most explicitly erotic paintings of his oeuvre, his rendering of Leda and the Swan is overtly sensual, with Leda’s hips turned towards the viewer and the swan wrapping around her wrist as his wings rise. Yet the painting speaks to classicism, and its eroticism is well dressed in a literary academia and rich in aesthetic value, Cézanne’s loose brushstrokes and subtle colours bringing a melancholy, erotic beauty to the scene that, nonetheless, feels a weight of historical context.