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Jupiter and Thetis

 The episode is taken from Homer's Iliad: the nymph Thetis, mother of Achilles, is imploring Jupiter to resolve the conflict between her son and Agamemnon, the leader of the Greek expedition to Troy – Jupiter's wife, Juno, looks on from afar. 

 "She sank to the ground beside him, put her left arm round his knees, raised her right hand to touch his chin, and so made her petition to the Royal Son of Cronos", Iliad 1.500–502

Jupiter and Thetis Stamp Collection

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Guinee  2002   Jupiter and Thetis by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres 1811 

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Ajman  1970    Jupiter and Thetis by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres 1811 

(The writing on the stamp is wrong)

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Paraguay  1976    Jupiter and Thetis by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres 1811 

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Togo  1980    Jupiter and Thetis by Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres 1811 

Jupiter and Thetis is an 1811 painting by the French neoclassical painter Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, in the Musée Granet, Aix-en-Provence, France. Painted when the artist was yet 31, the work severely and pointedly contrasts the grandeur and might of a cloud-born Olympian male deity against that of a diminutive and half nude nymph

The painting is steeped in the traditions of both classical and neoclassical art, most notably in its grand scale of 136⅝ × 101¼ inches. Ingres creates many visual contrasts between the god and the slithering nymph: Jupiter is shown facing the viewer frontally with both his arms and legs spread broadly across the canvas, while the color of his dress and flesh echoes that of the marble at his feet. In contrast, Thetis is rendered in sensuous curves and portrayed in supplication to the mercy of a cruel god who holds the fate of her son in his hands. Thetis' right hand falls on Jupiter's hip with a suggestion of erotic caress, while the dark green of her dress accents the dread and foreboding of the bare landscape behind. Her clothing is drawn up against her lower hip, and seems about to fall off. The focal point of the work is Thetis' left hand extended vertically upright as she attempts to stroke the beard of the god.

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