Artist
Carl Wilhelm Kolbe d. Ä. 1759 – 1835

About the work
In the Metamorphoses, Ovid tells how Zeus transformed his beloved Io into a cow so as to hide her from his jealous wife Juno. The latter, having become suspicious, had the cow guarded by the hundred-eyed shepherd Argus. In order to free Io, Jupiter dispatched Mercury, who first lulled the guard to sleep with his flute playing and then killed him. Kolbe has set the scene in an undulating rocky landscape, the centre of which is taken up by two huge oak trees. Thanks to the graphic fabric of the tightly composed scene in nuanced shades of black chalk, he created a lively interplay of light and shade in which the «main protagonists” are the two oak trees.