The symbolism of the peacock in art

The peacock has been a symbolically rich animal for centuries.

In China, it represents peace, beauty and prosperity.

In ancient Greece, the peacock was associated with the goddess Hera, daughter of Cronos and sister (and wife…) of Zeus, goddess of marriage and fertility. Zeus was always known for his infidelity and Hera, jealous of his conquests, asked Argos, a giant with 100 eyes, to watch over her husband who had fallen in love with a priestess named Io. Zeus, aware of this ruse, asked his son Hermes to kill Argos. He managed to put him completely to sleep (50 of his eyes were asleep while the other 50 were awake) and decapitated him. Hera then decided to recover the giant’s eyes to decorate the tail of the peacock, her favourite animal.

The peacock has subsequently been used frequently in art, either as a simple decorative element or to enhance a woman’s beauty, as in Albert André’s La Femme aux Paons, 1895, or Henry Caro- Delvaille’s Le Paon Blanc, which depicts 20th-century bourgeois society.