In celebration of the Museum's 10th anniversary and The Legacy of Homer exhibition, our friends at the Shepherd Gallery have helped the Museum acquire a sculpture by Eugène Guillaume depicting the mythological hero Theseus claiming his father's sword, and therefore his royal birthright. With this work, Guillaume won the prix de Rome at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, allowing him to undertake a five-year residency at the Villa Medici to study classical and Renaissance masterpieces.

The original prize-winning sculpture was irreparably damaged at the École during the student riots of 1968. Fortunately, Guillaume had made for himself our cast, which is now the only complete rendition of the work. A student of James Pradier (1790-1852), Guillaume later worked on major commissions for the Paris Opéra, the Louvre, the Bourse, and various churches across Paris.

We are pleased to announce that the entire balance of the Museum's Members' Art Acquisition Fund was matched in October 2005 by a gift from the Trustees to purchase this oil sketch by Jean-Léon Gérôme. The Museum already owned a Goupil photogravure of this image, and now the two artworks can be seen side by side in the galleries. The Trustees and staff are very grateful to all previous donors to the Fund, and now invite every friend of the Museum to help replenish this Fund in anticipation of future acquisitions as important as this.

Rachel (Elizabeth Rachel Félix, 1821-1858), a reigning star at Paris's Comédie-Française, was one of the most famous actresses of the 19th century. She and her sister, Sarah Félix, were friends of Gérôme and frequented his studio. Following Rachel's early death, Sarah commissioned a full-length portrait of her sister, which was first exhibited at the Salon of 1861 and then sold to the Comédie-Française, where it still hangs today. This portrait—well known through a photogravure of it published by Goupil & Cie—later played a central role in Henry James's novel The Tragic Muse (1890), in which the character of Miriam Rooth was inspired by Rachel.

The present sketch seems to be the first of four small preparatory paintings made by Gérôme, who drew upon portrait photographs and his own memory of his friend. He portrayed the actress as Melpomene, the muse of tragedy, leaning against a pedestal decorated with a relief of a tragic mask. In the finished portrait, the mask was replaced by the names of playwrights Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Corneille, and Racine. The painted column supporting a bronze statuette also carries a plaque that, in the ultimate painting, would list Rachel's greatest roles: Phedra, Hermione, Camille, Monime, Roxane, and Pauline. Another important source for this portrait is a Roman fresco (Naples, Archeological Museum) that depicts Medea in a similar pose holding a sword while contemplating the murder of her two sons as revenge against her unfaithful husband, Jason.

Born into a family of painters—Joseph and Carle Vernet were his grandfather and father, respectively—Horace quickly developed his own talent, which he applied primarily to depict French military achievements of his time. From 1828 to 1834, he was director of the French Academy in Rome, where he painted Italian genre scenes. In 1833, he made the first of his several visits to Algeria, resulting in Orientalist pictures as well as Biblical scenes set in the Middle East. Vernet found great favor with King Louis-Philippe (reigned 1830-1848), who as the Duke of Orléans had bought his work early on, and subsequently commissioned a series of large battle scenes for the palace of Versailles.

At the Paris Salon of 1836, Vernet exhibited The Lion Hunt (London, Wallace Collection) under the French title Chasse dans le désert de Sahara, 28 Mai 1833, implying that he had actually witnessed this hunting scene during his first trip to Algeria. The present sketch for that large and highly finished composition also shows the ferocious battle between man and wild animal. This subject had fascinated artists for centuries, and the exotic setting made such works even more appealing to a Western audience.

The Trustees and staff are delighted to thank Mr. Eberhard Geffers of New York City for his recent donation of a beautiful and instructive oil study by the important German academician Anselm Feuerbach (1829-1880). This painting can now be enjoyed in the handsome gallery of classically inspired works selected from the permanent collection, which leads into the autumn exhibition, The Legacy of Homer: Four Centuries of Art from the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris. Mr. Geffers's timing is impeccable because his Feuerbach epitomizes one of the ways in which academic artists conceptualized and re-envisioned their compositions over time—a point elaborated further in The Legacy of Homer. The Museum deeply appreciates Mr. Geffers's generosity and also his awareness of how perfectly his painting will enhance our mission for decades to come.

Feuerbach was a major painter who trained at the academies of Düsseldorf, Munich, and Antwerp, then studied with Thomas Couture (1815-1879) in Paris. He finally settled in Rome, where he eventually began working on his first version of Plato's Symposium (1869, Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe). Plato's text from ca. 384 BC, to which this painting refers, describes a banquet in which various guests deliver different speeches in honor of love.

Feuerbach's monumental canvas was criticized for its subdued tonality, so he made a second version, to which the present study relates (see photograph below). Set against a gold background, it shows a female head adorned with a wreath and necklace. The model Lucia Brunacci posed for the figure that, in the final composition, stands in the far left and supports the politician Alcibiades, a friend of Socrates. The head in the final painting is not set against a gold background, underlining the experimental quality of this study.