As a result, Zeus offered Endymion a choice, death in whatever way he preferred or eternal sleep with perpetual youth. Endymion chose the latter. He slept in a cave on Mount Latmus where Selene continued to visit him.

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The Greek poet, Licymnius of Chios, however, suggests that it was the god Hypnos (Sleep) who loved Endymion and lulled him to sleep with his eyes open so that the god might forever gaze into them.

Endymion was represented in ancient art as recumbent, usually nude or semi-nude, asleep, with one arm crooked behind his head. This motif appears commonly on sarcophagi of the Roman Empire. In the funerary context, the presence of Endymion suggests the possibility of a dream-like existence beyond death.

In domestic paintings and mosaics, the figure of Endymion is primarily erotic and represents not only male physical beauty, but also youthful innocence and sexual accessibility.

Numerous post-classical artists painted the story of Endymion, for example, Titian (ca 1508), Tintoretto (ca 1575-1580), Poussin (ca 1630), Rubens (ca 1636), van Loo (1731), and Fragonard (ca 1753-1755). Most notable is Endymion Asleep (1793) by Anne-Louis Girodet who captured not only the subtle effect of moonlight, but also the utter passivity of the supine Endymion.

In Jungian psychology, Endymion exemplifies the puer eternus (eternal youth), ageless, timeless, and fragilely connected to the invisible world, yet--at the same time--narcissistic, phallic, effeminate, and pensive.

Homoerotic photographers have evoked these "Endymion" qualities in numerous untitled compositions--luminous dreamboys, forever young and eternally available. A titled example is George Platt Lynes' Endymion and Selene (ca 1939).

Ancient Greek and Roman art represents a variety of homoerotic experience in several different ways.

The Greco-Roman myths concerning same-sex love have been of crucial importance to the Western gay and lesbian literary heritage, both as texts and as icons.

Homoeroticism is a prominent presence in neoclassicism, an artistic movement noted for its masculine style, its appreciation of male beauty, and its privileging of ancient Greece and Rome as civilizations to be emulated.

Several artists and art critics of the nineteenth century achieved a self-aware homosexual identity that is expressed in both their lives and their works, but lesbianism is only rarely depicted in terms of identity during this period.

The various cultural patterns, especially the conditions of artistic production and the types of subjects and themes represented, provide a great deal of evidence about Renaissance sexuality and art.

Although sparse in images documenting the gay community, pre-Stonewall gay male photography blurs the boundaries between art, erotica, and social history.

Throughout his long career, French neoclassical painter Anne-Louis Girodet-Trioson concentrated on subjects that confused and conflated masculine and feminine characteristics, and often imbued them with homoeroticism.

American photographer George Platt Lynes made his fame as a fashion and portrait photographer, but his greatest work may have been his dance images and male nudes.