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Europa and the Bull

Artist: Whalen, Thomas, RSA · 1903-1975

A very similar piece titled simply "Europa" features as plate LXVIII in George Bruce and Thomas Symington Halliday's 1946 book "Scottish Sculpture A record of twenty Years."

That piece, also executed in plaster and standing about 55cm high, varies in certain regards from the present work and the relationship between them remains obscure.

Most noticeably the musculature of both the bull and of the naked Europa who wrestles it is rather softer in the present work where the horns and ears of the beast are more pronounced and the head and hairstyle of Europa is much less stylised in the present work; her cheekbone and straight lined hair in particular are much more sharply executed in the illustrated version.

The subject is taken from ancient Greek mythology. The beauty of Europa, a Phoenecian princess, so captivated Zeus, the King of the Gods that he appeared to her in the from of a white bull and took her by force to Crete where she subsequently bore him three sons.

Her abduction is also referred to as the Rape of Europa yet here Whalen removes any such menace and endows her with the power to tame and control the metamorphosed God.