Tuesday 10 May 2016

‘The Veiled Rebecca’ by Giovanni Maria Benzoni

 

4058965985_43f8a669fb

‘‘The Veiled Rebecca’ is a miracle in marble. Conceived by Giovanni Benzoni in 1876, after the Biblical story of a young girl being offered up for marriage by her brother, the sculptor has somehow managed in solid stone to give the illusion that this is a modest yet alluring young woman clad only in a virtually transparent veil.

'The_Veiled_Rebekah'_by_Giovanni_Maria_Benzoni,_High_Museum

Very hard indeed to portray completely in photographs, I’m told by friends who have visited the original in Hyderabad (or one of the three copies around the world) that the illusion is virtually flawless – that you have been granted by the sculptor the ability to see through stone.

REbecca

The sculpture’s home at the Salar Jung Museum has an online gallery to explore further.

[Pics by kgoule, Salar Jung Museum, Wikimedia Commons]

.

1 comment:

Anderson said...

Whoa! This is the coolest thing I've seen all week, and possibly the most incredible piece of marble sculpture I've ever seen.