(Antwerp 1532–1603)
The Contest between the Muses and the Pierides (based on Ovid, Metamorphoses, V: 294–317),
oil on panel, 77 x 135 cm, framed

Exhibited:
Athens, National Gallery, Alexandros Soutzos Museum and Netherlands Institute, Greek Gods and Heroes in the Age of Rubens and Rembrandt, September 2000 – January 2001; and
Dordrecht, Dordrechts Museum, February – May 2001, no. 85

The contest between the Muses and the Pierides depicted here is described in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. The nine strong-voiced daughters of the Macedonian King Pieros, called “Pierides”, challenged the nine Muses, daughters of Zeus, father of the gods, in a singing contest. The judgement was to be made by a jury of nymphs, who eventually decided in favour of the Muses. When it was her turn, the very first Pieride offended Mount Olympus in a song about the cowardly deeds of the gods. This hubris displayed by a mortal was punished, as is frequently the case in ancient mythology. The nine sisters were deprived of their human bodies and transformed into magpies. The scene was rarely depicted in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Maarten de Vos was one among few Flemish artists who painted the subject.

Maarten de Vos began his career as a student of Frans Floris. In 1552 he travelled to Italy. He visited Rome and Florence and finally settled in Venice, where he entered the workshop of Tintoretto, and became his assistant and friend. He supplied the landscape backgrounds for some of his master’s compositions. His style combined Mannerist and realistic elements. In 1558, de Vos returned to Antwerp, where he became one of the town’s leading Italianates. Numerous altarpieces in the churches of Antwerp attest to his prolific activity.