Cupid and Psyche was painted in about 1473 and tells the first half of the ancient Greek story of a human princess, Psyche, who marries the god of love, Cupid. We selected the artwork for further research and to be part of the Fitzwilliam's Inspire project as we knew that visitors love the artwork and it's story.

It was painted for a grand bedroom in fifteenth-century Florence, which doubled as an entertaining space for the wife’s friends. The bedchamber was furnished at the time of a wedding, with a bed and chests but also painted stories that celebrated the love of a newly married couple.

The story highlights the loyalty of the bride to the groom, as was expected in the fifteenth century.

Have a look at the painting below.

Spend 5 minutes noting down what you can see.

What can you work out just by looking at it?

What do you think made us select this artwork for the Inspire2020 project and exhibition?

Write down your thoughts.

What would you want to find out about this painting?

Reading the painting

You can read the story in this painting from left to right, like a cartoon strip. Artists in the 1400s were very influenced by classical art which often has stories depicted in this way on the side of Greek vases or sarcophagi - such as in the example below.

This method of visual storytelling is called continuous narrative.

Can you spot the main characters?

Themes

We started by thinking about the story. Despite being painted in the early 1400s, this painting tells a famous Ancient Greek story which has been re-told for over 2000 years.

The Fitzwilliam painting depicts episodes from a version of the story written in the 2nd Century AD by Lucius Apuleius.

Research some different versions of the story.

Write a list of some of the common themes and some of the differences between accounts.

Provenance

What do we know about where this painting came from? During this time period, artists were commissioned to make things by wealthy patrons such as merchants, bankers and churches. Sometimes you can find clues to the origin of an object hidden in it's design.

Previous researchers have linked the painting to the wealthy Stozzi family as one of Psyche's suitors is shown holding a falcon and there is an image of a bird on another's coat. The Italian word for falconer is 'strozziere' and this emblem often appears on Strozzi family medals, furniture and tapestries. However, new research on the Cupid and Psyche painting by Renaissance expert and art historian Donal Cooper as part of the Ways of Seeing project has questionned this. He argues that the falcon on the suitors cloak is now seen to be gripping a ring which is the sign of the famous Florentine Medici family. The Medici are linked to other Cupid and Psyche related objects commissioned at this time which shows that they had a particular connection with this subject.

We think that these large panels were part of a decorated headboard called a spalliera which would have been been mounted high on the all in a grand Renaissance bed chamber. Sometimes they were mounted on a cassone, or large storage box. Cassoni were common gifts amongst the wealthy in the late middle ages in Italy and were often used during a wedding ceremony to carry a bride's dowry to her new home.

You will have noticed by now that this painting only tells half of the story. This panel would originally have been displayed as part of a set. As a part of our research, we were curious about the other panel. All museums keep files for each of their objects. We looked in the collections file for this work and saw that our panel was exhibited in 1911 as a part of an exhibition of Old Masters the Grafton Galleries in London.

We looked at the old exhibition catalogue in the Fitzwilliam Library. The catalogue noted that the panels were kept together until at least 1879 when they were in the collection of a Mr. Alexander Barker, member of the Burlington Fine Art club. He bought them from the Auction House Christie’s in 1874.

In the collections file we also found a note that a private art collector, Mrs. Hester Diamond had come to the Fitzwilliam Museum to see our panel and meet the keeper of the collection, Jane Munro, in 1990 – shortly after buying the other half of the panel. Mrs. Diamond was a private art collector.

Many artworks in private collections or museums and have been separated from other works that give it context. This happens when artworks are removed from its original location.

What do you think about this?

Learning about the materials and construction of the painting can tell us a lot about how it was made, where it came from and any changes that might have occurred over time. As a part of the Ways of Seeing project, research scientist Paola Ricciardi (pictured above) and conservator Vicky Sutcliffe carried out technical analyses on the painting to investigate it in closer detail, and to enable us to see things that you can’t see with the naked eye.

Make a mind map of all the things you think we could learn.

Think about the materials, construction and provenance.

What would you like to find out about the painting?

X-radiography

X-rays are energy waves that are absorbed by different materials with different levels of efficacy. They can be used to make an image of an object's internal structure, called an x-radiograph. When they are absorbed by dense material they block the waves from reaching the film and leave an absence (a bit like a silhouette).

This enables us to see what is inside the panel - or inside your body, if you're unlucky!

Before you scroll any further - have a look at the x-ray image above. Look for distinct colour differences and unusual shapes.

What do you notice on the x-ray image that you don’t see on the panel?

What do these things tell you about how the panel was made?

What we discovered from the x-ray image

Infrared imaging

Thin paint layers, opaque to visible light, are often partially transparent to infrared radiation. White gesso, which was used to prepare the wood, and to a lesser extent other light-coloured grounds, reflect infrared rays. This reflection can be reduced where there is drawing, especially if the drawing is with a carbon-based black material such as charcoal. Therefore, the infrared image reveals features below the painted surface, including the preparatory drawings made by the artist.

Although not evident on this painting, later retouches that are usually invisible to the naked eye can also be revealed in this way.

Zoom in carefully.

Before you scroll down, can you see any of this work?

What we discovered from the infrared image

Flying cupid

The infrared image shows the artist working out Cupid’s position and making several adjustments to his wings and feet.

Pigment analysis

At the Fitzwilliam Museum, we have an analytical laboratory with instruments that allow us to take high-magnification images and to identify materials used in the painting. Scientists with a specific experience of studying artworks can use this information to reveal what type of paint was used by the artist, how the paint was made, and sometimes even where its components came from.

What we discovered from pigment analysis

During the medieval period, making paint was an art in itself that was often the job of a child apprentice who would work in the artist’s workshop. They would have to mix the colourful ground minerals with a paint binder. In the case of this panel, the binder was egg yolk.

Look at your mind map.

What were you right about?

Has the information revealed by the scientific analysis made you curious about anything else?

As a part of the research project, we also commissioned a historic paintings conservator, Elsbeth Geldhof, to make a reproduction of two sections of the painting. We asked her to make these in the same way that the original painting was made, drawing on the findings of our technical analyses. We also wanted her to leave it part-finished – so that anyone looking at the artwork could see and understand the process that Jacobo del Sellaio would have undertaken in order to paint Cupid and Psyche.

Making a reproduction in the same way that the artist would have done, helped us to look at the painting in a different way.

Is there anything on your mind map that you are particularly interested in?

Perhaps you could investigate one of these avenues further.