Amsterdam artist Hendrik de Keyser’s 1615 sculpture Screaming Child Stung by a Bee was probably inspired by an idyllium of the Greek poet Theocritus in which Cupid is stung while stealing honey from a hive. When he complains to his mother that so small a creature should cause such great pain, she responds that he himself is small but deals wounds that are grievous.

Painter Joseph Ducreux and sculptor Franz Xaver Messerschmidt also experimented with extreme facial expressions.