The Barberini Faun - A "Standard" View
The Wickford Glyptothek
The Barberini Gigolo
First, my favorite of all sculptures, the "Barberini Faun" or "Sleeping Satyr", now in the collection of the Glyptothek in München, Germany. This sculpture was found hidden in the Mausoleum of Hadrian in the 17th century. this homoerotic masterpiece is larger than life, and it was carved about 200 B.C., in one of of the post-Alexandrine kingdoms in the Eastern Mediterranean, most likely at Antioch in Syria.
Here is the "customary" view of the Barberini Faun:
The Barberini Faun - A "Standard" View
The sculpture seems quite innocent and only mildly titillating from that demure angle, but consider what it looks like from a markedly different perspective:
The Barberini Faun - An "In Your Face" View
When seen from this angle, the lazy, languid pose of the anonymous Hellenistic hunk emphasizes the highly charged erotic content of this marble block of beefcake; its blunt message seems obvious to the sensitive and receptive viewer. The Barberini Faun is the oldest surviving example of monumental homoerotic art in existence.
I have always suspected that the Barberini Faun was carved by a great, gay sculptor, on commission from some lustful dirty old man of lucullan wealth who wanted a spectacular souvenir of his all-time favorite call boy during what I shall euphemistically describe as "those sublime moments after".
To put it another way, the sculptor of the Barberini Faun was the Robert Mapplethorpe of his era.
By the way, as you may have noticed from the subtitle for this page, I have my own preferred title for this statue. I call it "The Barberini Gigolo".
Here is another view of the sculpture that one never sees on a postcard, or anywhere else for that matter. This is what the Barberini Gigolo looks like from behind.
I have many more photos of this wonderful, wonderful work of art, showing it from all angles, and I will add a number of them to this page in due course.
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pediment sculptures from the Temple of Aphaia at Aegina.
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Copyright, Teri Noel Towe, 1997
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