The Roses of Heliogabalus

Alma-Tadema painted this scene of the Roman emperor Heliogabalus in 1888, in his studio in St John's Wood, London. He was 52, the most successful painter of classical subjects in Victorian Britain, and he had spent years researching Roman architecture, furniture, and dress to make his paintings archaeologically accurate. This is his most famous work. The emperor Heliogabalus reclines on a couch at the center of a banquet hall, watching his guests. Above him, a false ceiling has been opened, and rose petals are pouring down on the banqueters. The guests are being smothered. Some try to shield their faces, others are already buried under the weight of the flowers. Heliogabalus watches with a faint smile, wearing a gold wreath and a purple robe, a cup of wine in his hand. The story comes from the Historia Augusta, a Roman text of uncertain reliability, which records that Heliogabalus once suffocated his dinner guests under a shower of rose petals released from a reversible ceiling. The story is probably fiction, but Alma-Tadema painted it as if it were real, with every detail of the architecture and the furniture based on Roman sources. Alma-Tadema was born in Friesland in the Netherlands in 1836. He moved to London in 1870, where he built a career painting scenes of Roman domestic life. His paintings were enormously popular in the late 19th century, bought by American and British collectors for large sums. His reputation collapsed in the 20th century, when modernist critics dismissed his work as over-finished and sentimental, but it has recovered in recent decades. He is now recognized as one of the most technically accomplished painters of the Victorian period. Oil on canvas, 133 by 213 centimeters, roughly 52 by 84 inches. Alma-Tadema painted with a smooth, highly finished surface, building the roses in layers of thin glazes. The petals are rendered individually, each one a separate brushstroke of pink, white, or red. The figures are painted with the same precision, their draperies and jewelry based on actual Roman objects that Alma-Tadema had studied in museums. The wide horizontal format and rich colors make this print work well in a living room or dining room with warm walls. The Roman subject suits a traditional interior. A gold frame is traditional for Alma-Tadema. The 18x24 size gives the figures and the roses enough room to read. This is a public domain artwork. We print it on archival matte paper at sizes from 8x10 to 18x24 inches, framed or unframed. The image is printed at full resolution with no cropping.