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Bernhard Afinger (1813–1882) was a German sculptor of the 19th century, who mainly created sculptures and reliefs in the historicist style. One of his most famous sculptures is Penelope. The marble sculpture shows the wife of the Greek king Odysseus working at her loom, longing for her husband's return. Considered a historicist masterpiece, Penelope demonstrates Afinger's talent for depicting emotional and psychological states.

The female figure is seated upright beside a column covered with the finished garment, on which her left forearm rests. Originally, there was a lamp burning next to her, but it is no longer in existence. Her head is turned to the right and she holds the weaver's shuttle in her lowered right hand. Her right foot is resting on a small bench. The sculpture was made for the garden of the villa of Ludwig von Lilienthal, a local manufacturer and patron of the arts, on the Wolkenburg in (Wuppertal-) Elberfeld. Afinger also made the monument to the German painter Johann Richard Seel, which stands in the cemetery on Hochstrasse in Wuppertal.