The Story
Apollo and Marsyas is a 1637 oil on canvas painting by Jusepe de Ribera, now in the Museo nazionale di Capodimonte in Naples. Heavily influenced by Caravaggio, he produced another version, also in 1637, now in the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium in Brussels. Signed and dated at the bottom right, Ribera's painting shows his full mature style, combining the crude and immediate Caravaggist realism with 17th century Neapolitan tenebrism with its accentuation of dramatic and violent figures.
With his bad teeth visible, Marsyas turns to the viewer, making us witnesses to his pleas for mercy, whilst Apollo opens a deep wound with no facial expression beyond perhaps a subtle smile. The lyre and panpipes are hung up at the right above three fellow satyrs. The use of colour is particularly fine, reaching its apex in Apollo's robe, the sky and Marsyas' body.
Executed in Oil on canvas, measuring 63 3/4 x 45 in. (161.9 x 114.3 cm), the surface rewards close looking. Jusepe de Ribera builds the composition through layered glazes and a tightly controlled palette, letting cool shadows recede so that the warm, lit passages step forward. The brushwork shifts from the precise to the almost dissolved — a hallmark of mature Baroque practice.
“A silence so complete it becomes its own witness.”
