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Your gallerySalome Asking Herod for the Head of Saint John the Baptist
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Find Salome kneeling in black on the patterned rug, then follow the servants with their dishes through the open rooms behind the table.
At Herod’s feast, Salome kneels before the table to name her reward. The Art Institute of Chicago explains that Herod, in blue at the end of the table, was so delighted by his stepdaughter’s dancing that he gave in, unwillingly, when she asked for John’s head. Servants carry dishes through the palace behind, and musicians play at the right.
Tempera on panel · 69.1 × 36 cm · Art Institute of Chicago · Renaissance · Late Gothic and Early Renaissance
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Details and source
- Museum title
- Salome Asking Herod for the Head of Saint John the Baptist
- Artist
- Giovanni di Paolo (Italian, 1398–1482)
- Date
- 1455–60
- Medium
- Tempera on panel
- Dimensions
- 69.1 × 36 cm (27 3/16 × 14 3/16 in.); Framed: 80.1 × 47.7 × 8.3 cm (31 1/2 × 18 3/4 × 3 1/4 in.)
- Credit line
- Mr. and Mrs. Martin A. Ryerson Collection
- Image license
- CC0 1.0 · Public domain
- Museum record
- Art Institute of Chicago
Galler’s rooms and hanging scale are imagined. The image is the museum’s original digital reproduction.