Lesbia Weeping over a
Sparrow by the Dutch born British painter Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadelma
(1836-1912).
Alma Tadema refers here
to the poem Lesbia's Sparrow by the Roman poet Gaius Valerius
Catullus.
"All you Loves and
Cupids cry and all you men of feeling my girl's sparrow is dead..."
Sometimes kitsch is irritating, but Lesbia was shown here as a realistic, three dimensional woman, not a pale anorexic silent "model" woman. Alma Tadema was smart.
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