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Lot Essay
Born in Switzerland and trained in Italy, Angelica Kauffman came to London in 1766, where she established herself as one of the city’s most prominent and influential artists. In 1768, she and thirty-four other artists petitioned the king to establish a Royal Academy, and in the following year was one of just two women included in its first catalogue with the designation ‘R. A.’ after her name. In the 1770s Kauffman drew upon the epics of Homer and Virgil for subjects. The resulting works were widely exhibited and among her first commercial successes with history paintings in England.
Kauffman particularly favored the character Penelope, inventing several compositional themes centered on the loyal wife of Odysseus. Here, the nurse Euryclea, awakes the sleeping Penelope with the news of Ulysses’ return after many years away fighting in the Trojan War. During his long absence, Penelope cunningly avoids marrying any of the over one hundred suitors who attempt to claim her as their wife, remaining loyal to her husband. In order to prove that he is, in fact, her husband, Penelope announces a contest. Whoever can string Ulysses’ rigid bow and shoot it through twelve axe heads can have her hand in marriage. Ulysses does this handily, yet Penelope tests him further, fearing he is a god in disguise. She finally accepts him as her true husband after he correctly describes their bed. In addition to this theme, Kauffman conceives of other narrative compositions where Penelope is used as a symbol of the ideal wife and mother, including Penelope sacrificing to Minerva for the safe return of her Son, Telemachus, which remains in the collections of Stourhead, where the present work once hung.
Kauffman painted another, nearly identical version of this composition, which she signed and dated 1772 and is today in the Vorarlberger Landesmuseum, Bregenz (see B. Baumgärtel, op. cit., p. 378, no. 223). The present version, which exhibits several variations to the composition, was part of the collections the magnificent Palladian mansion in Salisbury, Stourhead. Stourhead was acquired by the Hoare family in 1717, at which time the original manor house was demolished and a new house, one of the first of its kind, was designed by Colen Campbell and then built by Nathaniel Ireson between 1721 and 1725. Over the course of the following two centuries, Stourhead would remain in the Hoare family and was filled with an impressive art collection and distinguished library.
We are grateful to Wendy Wassyng Roworth for her assistance cataloging this work on the basis of photographs.
Kauffman particularly favored the character Penelope, inventing several compositional themes centered on the loyal wife of Odysseus. Here, the nurse Euryclea, awakes the sleeping Penelope with the news of Ulysses’ return after many years away fighting in the Trojan War. During his long absence, Penelope cunningly avoids marrying any of the over one hundred suitors who attempt to claim her as their wife, remaining loyal to her husband. In order to prove that he is, in fact, her husband, Penelope announces a contest. Whoever can string Ulysses’ rigid bow and shoot it through twelve axe heads can have her hand in marriage. Ulysses does this handily, yet Penelope tests him further, fearing he is a god in disguise. She finally accepts him as her true husband after he correctly describes their bed. In addition to this theme, Kauffman conceives of other narrative compositions where Penelope is used as a symbol of the ideal wife and mother, including Penelope sacrificing to Minerva for the safe return of her Son, Telemachus, which remains in the collections of Stourhead, where the present work once hung.
Kauffman painted another, nearly identical version of this composition, which she signed and dated 1772 and is today in the Vorarlberger Landesmuseum, Bregenz (see B. Baumgärtel, op. cit., p. 378, no. 223). The present version, which exhibits several variations to the composition, was part of the collections the magnificent Palladian mansion in Salisbury, Stourhead. Stourhead was acquired by the Hoare family in 1717, at which time the original manor house was demolished and a new house, one of the first of its kind, was designed by Colen Campbell and then built by Nathaniel Ireson between 1721 and 1725. Over the course of the following two centuries, Stourhead would remain in the Hoare family and was filled with an impressive art collection and distinguished library.
We are grateful to Wendy Wassyng Roworth for her assistance cataloging this work on the basis of photographs.