The Death of Procris

The Death of Procris at the Gardner Museum illustrates the tragic coda to the myth of Cephalus and his wife Procris: Cephalus, given a javelin that never misses its mark by the goddess Diana, accidentally kills Procris while she is secretly watching him hunt, suspecting infidelity. Ovid tells the story in Metamorphoses VII with particular attention to the couple's mutual jealousy — Procris had herself been unfaithful — making it a meditation on how love and suspicion lead to irreversible tragedy. The horizontal format of this panel (35 × 75 cm) is consistent with the Gardner's sister panels from the same series, and the pastoral setting emphasizes the cruel irony of death arriving in a landscape of natural beauty. Veronese's ability to combine the pathos of death with visual elegance was central to his appeal for sophisticated Venetian collectors. Procris dying in the grass, Cephalus bending in horror over her body, the faithful hound Laelaps witnessing the scene — these elements gave the painter opportunities for varied figure poses within a tightly unified composition.

The composition captures the pathos of the discovery with restrained emotion. Veronese's palette combines the green tones of the forest setting with the pale flesh of the dying Procris, creating a mood of elegiac beauty.