Ancient Rome (series of 4)

Ancient Rome is a trio of almost identical paintings by Italian artist Giovanni Paolo Panini, produced as pendant paintings to Modern Rome for his patron, the comte de Stainville, in the 1750s. The paintings depict many of the most significant architectural sites and sculptures from ancient Rome, such as the Colosseum, the Pantheon, Laocoön and His Sons, the Farnese Hercules, the Apollo Belvedere and the Borghese Gladiator. Both Panini and Stainville are featured: Stainville stands holding a guidebook, while Panini appears behind Stainville's armchair. The three versions of Ancient Rome, in order of creation, are located in the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Louvre in Paris. The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Louvre each hold a version of Panini's companion piece, Modern Rome; and the third version is in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.