Prometheus Being Chained By Vulcan
Dirck van Baburen
DIRCK VAN BABUREN, 1623. OIL ON CANVAS.
Prometheus stole fire from the Gods and gave it to the mortals. In some versions of the story, it was he who crafted humans from clay and used the fire to imbue them with life, in others the fire was merely a tool to allow them to create civilisation. Yet in all tellings, the ending if the same; the great Titan Prometheus is bound to rock by the blacksmith God Vulcan, god of fire, volcanoes and deserts, and for eternity has his liver consumed by an eagle. It is one of many stories from the ancient world that artists of the Baroque drew their stories from yet is devoid of so much of the romance more commonly seen in the movement. Van Baburen’s depiction borrows heavily from the work of Renaissance artists before him, adapting Caravaggio’s depiction of St. Paul to become his Prometheus most notably. Yet for all the obvious influences, van Barburen brings new light to an ancient story and find the humanity, the religion and the beauty in myth.