Bernini's Apollo & Daphne 1622-25, Rome

• Created by Gian Lorenzo Bernini in 1622-1625, Rome
• Daphne was a nymph who rejected Apollo's advances and prayed to be turned into a tree to escape him.
• The sculpture depicts the moment when Apollo catches up with Daphne as she transforms into a laurel tree.
• Bernini played a considerable part in Urban VIII’s legacy – dominating the Roman art world of the seventeenth century, flourishing under the patronage of its cardinals and popes while also challenging contemporary artistic traditions.
• Bernini created a series of over life-size marble statues for Cardinal Scipione Borghese, and this established his role as the foremost sculptor in Italy.
• Iconography


  laurel leaves have symbolic value in this story as Apollo embraced the bush and made it evergreen so as never to forget his love for Daphne. For this reason, Apollo may be identified by a laurel wreath.
• Composition and light


  According to 20th -century art historian, Howard Hibbard, Bernini intended for the sculpture of Apollo and Daphne to be viewed side on, allowing the observer to see the figures’ reactions simultaneously. The dynamic composition arching up in a diagonal is fitting for the transient moment – Apollo has only just lay a hand upon her hip, which was sheathed in bark lightning quick and her hands and toes seem to sprout laurel branches even as we look on.
• Style


  High Baroque. 4 Bernini’s Apollo and Daphne epitomises the Baroque style with a characteristically hyperbolic sense of drama.
• colour


  white Carrara marble to signify the Classical and learned past of Antiquity. Particularly suited to this pagan legend.
• the Apollo and Daphne, 1622–24, illustrates the typically Baroque theme of metamorphosis. Subtle variations in the texture of the marble create the illusion of soft human flesh transforming into the leaves and bark of a tree.
• This pagan chase may have been a little too risqué even for Scipione because there is a Christian message in the Latin couplet composed by the soon-to-be Pope, Urban VIII, reading: "Those who love to pursue fleeing forms of pleasure, In the end find only leaves and bitter berries in their hands." The religious context of the period has the potential to shift the meaning of the sculpture insofar as the moralising message may be issuing a warning to the viewer.
• Materials and processes


  The medium imparts connotations of nobility and status. Bernini used the reductive method (taking stone away) in the direct carving process, and was famed for exploiting marble’s low-tensile properties and pushing the medium to its limit.
• Interestingly, marble is a rock that results from its metamorphosis from limestone or dolomite rock. The whiter the colour the fewer the impurities were present during the process of its change.
• The stone is also highly polished in places which also renders the figures’ flesh believable and provides a contrast with the equally alive drapery. The low light-refractive index and porous quality of stone easily suggests skin in Bernini’s hands.
• Sanford Edward describes Michelangelo’s ‘love’ of stone and the material properties of white marble in particular:

  "The use of marble gives its surface visual depth, evoking a translucent quality comparable to human flesh."
• Apollo's drapery


  • Characteristically animated so as to defy gravity
  • Folds are deeply carved out (undercut) and lend a sense of transience to the scene
• Daphne's mouth


  • Hyperbolically ajar, is hollowed out using a hand-drill
• Bernini's basic tools


  • Mallet (a hammer with a broad, barrel-shaped head)
  • Chisel (a pointed metal tool with a sharp end)
• Carving process


  1. Claw chisels (with teeth) used to take away small amounts of material

  2. Flat chisels used to smooth out

  3. Rasps or files used to render chisel marks virtually invisible

  4. Wet or dry sandpaper used to polish in varying degrees
• Cardinal Scipione Borghese commissioned Apollo and Daphne in 1622 to replace Bernini’s Pluto and Proserpina which he had gifted to Cardinal Ludovisi. Originally, Apollo and Daphne were located near the wall but has seen been displayed in the centre of the room.
• On Apollo and Daphne the only tool marks visible are on the rough-hewn rock at the foot of the pair
• Influences


  Bernini’s interest in the human form and skill in manipulating marble ensured that he would be considered a worthy successor of the great High Renaissance sculptor, Michelangelo. Schama states that ‘Bernini worshipped Michelangelo’
• Many elements of Bernini's style reveal the influence of Mannerist and Hellenistic sculpture.10 Art historian, Rudolf Wittkower, describes how Bernini ‘incorporates in his work essential features of Mannerist statuary, namely complex relationships, broken contours, and protruding extremities. He takes advantage, in other words, of the Mannerist freedom from the limitations imposed by stone’.