A Statue of Penelope

The Museo Pio-Clementino is one of the sculpture museums in the enormous Vatican Museum, and it showcases works of Greek and Roman sculpture.  This statue of Penelope is a Roman copy of Greek original. According to one expert, "the copyist has exchanged the stool of the original for a rock and has given the figure the face of an androgynous youth." She is shown in the pose of the thinker, which historically is how she has been portrayed from Homer onwards, as she grapples with the nightmare thrust upon her and her need to be strategic and survive.

Walking through this Vatican gallery, the experience is like this - often crowded and with a sense that these legendary figures are frozen in time and space, rather tragically, I think.