Cephalus and Procris (study)

Procris suspects her husband of seeing another woman and follows him out hunting, hiding in the undergrowth to watch. He hears a rustle, takes it for an animal and throws his javelin. Ovid has Cephalus tell it himself in the seventh book of the Metamorphoses. Rubens caught the beat before the throw, with Cephalus reaching for the weapon and his wife still alive in the bushes. The same museum holds the large canvas made from this little panel, painted by Peeter Symons, and the interesting difference is in her face. In the sketch Procris looks straight at her husband, hard. In the finished canvas she has the look of someone waiting for what is about to happen. Behind them the wood is painted the way Rubens painted landscape in his last years, with the light coming through the trees in separate touches.