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Commissioned by the city of Stockholm to make a monument for King Gustavus III of Sweden, Sergel presented the first sketch in 1790, and one year later a proportional model in plaster. After the full-scale, no longer extant model was completed in 1793, it took six more years for the bronze to be cast, the unveiling taking place only in 118108. In designing his portrait statue, Sergel was inspired by one of the most famous of classical statues, the Apollo Belvedere, but the figure of Gustavus, which is in imaginary ancient military dress that echoes contemporary clothing as well, is the wrong way round compared with the distinguished model. The free leg of the model becomes the engaged leg, while the drapery over the right arm of the king corresponds to the cloth around the outstretched left arm of Apollo. Finally, the taut physicality of the young, muscular archer of Antiquity becomes a rather slack pose of a ruler in the transition between the late Baroque and Neoclassicism.
As a patron of art and literature, Gustavus III had founded the Royal Opera in 1773, and in 1776 the Swedish Academy, on the French model. He was also a man of letters who wrote plays and operas. His foreign policy was aimed at weakening the ant-Swedish alliance between Denmark and Russia. This led to his declaring war on Russia in 1788, which ended in 1790 in the Treaty of Värälä without any territorial changes. Depicted by Sergel at the moment of landing from the campaign, Gustavus supports himself with his left hand on a a kind of commemorative stone, holding the laurel wreath of the victor. In his right hand he holds the olive bough of peace (lost on the model), indicating the intention and success of his campaign.
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