Kadriorg museum opens exhibition on Ovid’s Metamorphoses

The Kadriorg Art Museum opens an exhibition on October 10 exploring the influence of Ovid’s Metamorphoses on European culture, ERR reports. The show brings together artworks based on the Roman poet’s myths from museums in Estonia, Czechia, France and Sweden, alongside rare historical books from libraries.

Ovid’s Metamorphoses recounts more than 250 Greek and Roman myths, including the stories of Narcissus and Pygmalion. Its accounts of gods’ love affairs and physical transformations have inspired artists from the late Middle Ages to the present, earning the work a reputation as a “Bible for artists.”

The exhibition also looks at how illustrated, translated and annotated editions helped shape new ways of reading and interpreting the work. Images and text complemented one another, while illustrations helped spread visual traditions across Europe.

Several myths in the poem deal with power and violence. One is the story of the goddess Diana and the hunter Actaeon, depicted in the ceiling painting in the main hall of Kadriorg Palace. The exhibition places the painting, previously interpreted as an allegory of the Great Northern War, in the context of 18th-century court culture and wider European history.

It also examines how European rulers and interest groups in the 17th and 18th centuries used Ovid’s work and life for ideological purposes. Myths about abuses of power, violence, empowerment and gender identity are considered through contemporary social theories.

The exhibition is curated by Kerttu Männiste and Sophie Turner and will run until March 21.