Pan e le Amadriadi

Sculpture

This extraordinary ceramic frieze, entitled Pan and the Hamadryads, was designed as interior decoration for a private dwelling. The artist, Fausto Melotti, was one of the leading lights of Italian sculpture in the 20th-century. This bas-relief is the peak of the artist’s ceramic output. It was already finished in the early months of 1950, when it appeared in the May edition of the magazine Domus; it is thus plausible to set the date of the depicted execution at least to the year before. The bas-relief frieze, made up of five parts (two corner and three central pieces) is designed to hide the joints. It tells of a mythological scene, though one that lacks any precise source in classical art.