Circe

Jan Steen's Circe, held at the Grosvenor Museum in Chester, belongs to the strand of his work that drew on classical mythology as a vehicle for the same themes of human folly and sensory indulgence he explored in his genre scenes. The enchantress Circe — who turned Odysseus's men into pigs — offered a mythological parallel for themes of seduction, loss of reason, and transformation through appetite that Steen explored repeatedly in his everyday scenes. His treatment of mythology was characteristically demystifying: Circe in a Steen composition would have been placed within a setting that recalled the Dutch interior as much as classical antiquity, and her power over men read as an allegory for female seduction within recognisable social contexts. The Grosvenor Museum's collection reflects the British taste for Dutch Golden Age painting that developed strongly through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The undated work is consistent with Steen's mature handling.

Steen's treatment of a mythological subject retained the warm, naturalistic lighting and figure handling of his genre work. Circe's classical attributes — wand, cup, transformed animals — would have been integrated within a domestic or theatrical setting. The figure's dress and setting likely blended classical and contemporary Dutch costume in Steen's characteristic anachronistic manner.