Featured CAMEOS: Show & Tell or Ask & Answer

This is gorgeous. I see her as Aphrodite.

 

Bronwen, what is the true definition of a cameo? Do metal ones count? Just sharing, I love her.

 

She stayed in the sauna WAAAAAAAY too long!!!!!!!!! and roasted her eyeballs!!!!! AAAAND lips!!!!

 

The anchor as symbol of Hope appears frequently in popular cameo compositions. See:

https://cameotimes.com/index.php/profiles-1/allegorical/anchor-of-hope

Interesting notion that this guy could be a Christian contending with a lion, but it would usually be Faith that would sustain a Christian martyr, not Hope. Critter looks more like a panther to me, although could be a lioness.

 

Think I would say any relief carving, or item that mimics a relief carving, such as a molded piece, that is intended for wear as jewellery falls under the heading 'cameo'. There is no settled etymology for the word.

Henryk Winograd's pieces are fine silver over something else, plaster or similar. This is one of the most popular designs. I have his version of Perseus.

 

Gorgeous. I was looking at all his designs yesterday. I saw the above listed as Mercury. Is there a reference catalog of his work somewhere?

 

I've never looked for a catalogue, suppose there could be. He also did Judaica. His pieces turn up regularly, but sellers do not always know what the HW stands for, so sometimes you can find a bargain. Looking at the current crop on eBay, see sellers are pricing as though the pieces are solid silver. They are not.

Hermes/Mercury lends Perseus his winged sandals & his cap of invisibility to go after Medusa. There is sense in Perseus wearing a winged cap; there is no sense in Mercury wearing armor with Medusa for an aegis.

 

I've been curious about the cameo worn by Vivian Leigh in some of the scenes in Gone With the Wind. She wears it during Melanie's death scene, as well as in the famous final "Frankly, my dear..." scene with Rhett. It's huge!



I was searching for a clear large still photo in order to get a good look at the cameo... at first I thought it might be a depiction of The Abduction/Rape of Ganymede...



but then I found this photo, in which the figure clearly (IMHO) appears female, with a ponytail of curls:



We've seen lots of "Hera Feeding the Eagle (Zeus)" cameos, but I've not seen one of her riding the eagle... is that what this depicts? Or, despite the very feminine appearance, is it meant to be Ganymede... who was, after all, a beautiful young man/boy.

FYI, the cameo is said to have been borrowed from costume designer Walter Plunkett's mother's jewelry collection, Plunkett wanting a huge piece to draw the eye to Scarlett's face when she is wearing all-black mourning. The internet says the cameo is now kept at the Margaret Herrick Library in Beverly Hills, "a world-renowned, non-circulating reference and research collection devoted to the history and development of the motion picture as an art form and an industry".

I wish there were a photo of the back, I'd love to know if it was signed.
@Bronwen perhaps you know more about this infamous cameo?

 

Woahhh! An impressive piece
I don't remember the cameo in the film... wasn't interested at all in cameos then

 

That's less a piece of jewelry than wall decoration. Dang that thing's big!

 

I always wondered about that cameo, too.

 

Hadn't seen this one before & it definitely deserves a place in the history of cameos as fashion. It doesn't really add up to any mythological scene. Suspect it was brand new when Walter Plunkett's mother acquired it, so nouveau Italien, as I think of it.

Some echoes of Hebe, also of Aurora, but reminds me too of Garuda, since the figure is riding the bird, not being carried away involuntarily.

 

It's a nice piece of carving and definitely fit with something Scarlett would have had. (I still want to rock that red dress of hers some day. )

 

With the presence of the reins on the bird, it does seem the ride was a planned enjoyment, rather than an impulsive kidnapping. And I believe the putto/cherub/cupid strewing flowers above the bird/rider is meant to indicate love, though this could be erotic or otherwise.

It's so big that that I'm wondering if maybe it began as a placque on a box or something!

 

I see Ganymede-inspired/misinterpreted?

And Cupid/Eros is there trying to collect on a gambling debt.

https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/37.3.10/

 

Are we being allusive?

https://www.thorvaldsensmuseum.dk/en/collections/work/A395/zoom



Another Thorvaldsen influence is Day:

https://www.thorvaldsensmuseum.dk/en/collections/work/A902/zoom



who owes a lot to Guido Reni's Aurora:

 

I was thinking of this:

He is not always portrayed as acquiescent: in the Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes, Ganymede is furious at the god Eros for having cheated him at the game of chance played with knucklebones, and Aphrodite scolds her son for "cheating a beginner."

Which came up when I was researching knucklebones... which I was doing because (I think) you mentioned it in reference to that funny little intaglio I posted. A while back. Probably in this very thread.

 

For anyone not quite following, the Thorvaldsen relief is Ganymede & Cupid playing knucklebones. It came up as a possibility for this scene back at post 969:

 

Two little cameos I have just acquired for interest.
1) Chalk? Or soft plaster? Quite worn.
2) Shell- Angel and cherub- damaged and her proportions are a bit iffy but I thought it was quite sweet although she has had a foot-ectomy at some point!
3) Not a cameo but a painting I was studying high up beside the stage in a local hall. I was bored watching a performance and spent most of the evening craning my neck to work out who she was and if she really was gazing at a severed head ( she is) I thought I know who to ask!!.
Any information very welcome.
Thankyou

 

Hi,
With the lyre ,pan pipes and horns I am seeing St Cecilia or the Goddess Teriripatone sorry about the spelling the lightning here is fierce and I am afraid of losing power any second.
greg