The discus thrower

At the end of the 1700th century, several different sculptures of discus throwers were found in Rome and Tivoli. At this time people had also begun to become more aware of the differences that existed between ancient Greece and ancient Rome as far as art was concerned. The Art Academy in Stockholm also expanded its ancient plaster collection with more and more Greek works.

The original behind the Art Academy's discus thrower can be found today in the British Museum in London. When it was found in 1791, the head was missing: and whoever has tried to reconstruct it has turned it the wrong way – when he turns away, he can never get the best power in the throw! Sportsmen were popular subjects - and the Olympic Games have their roots in Greece. The discus was also the opening event in the ancient pentathlon.

The sculptor Johan Niklas Byström was a student of Sergel and himself worked with antique-inspired, neoclassical art. In 1829, he sold two casts to the Art Academy of different variants of the Discus Thrower. They cost a total of 220 riksdaler and 4 shillings banco including the transport from Italy, a sum that the Academy was happy to pay, as they saw the sculptures as important complements to the older plaster casts. Unfortunately, one of the Discus Throwers disappeared or was destroyed during the 1900th century when old casts were not valued as much as they are today.

The young, well-trained male body that the Discus Thrower shows off obviously had its admirers among artists in older times. And in Nazi-era Germany it was almost worshipped. After much persuasion, in 1938 Hitler managed to buy the ancient discus thrower that was in Rome to display at the Glyptotheket in Munich. However, Italian politicians deeply disagreed with this decision and ten years later it was brought back to Rome.