Richard Wilson, 1713/4–1782, British, active in Italy (1750–56)
Title:
The Destruction of the Children of Niobe
Date:
1760
Materials & Techniques:
Oil on canvas
Dimensions:
58 x 74 inches (147.3 x 188 cm)
Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1977.14.81
Gallery Label:
Probably begun while Richard Wilson was in Italy but exhibited after his return to London in the first public exhibition of contemporary art in 1760, The Destruction of the Children of Niobe was a key picture both in Wilson’s career and in the development of landscape painting in Britain. Within a stormy landscape setting that echoes the violence of the mythological episode taking place, the children of Niobe, the proud queen of Thebes, are slain by Apollo and Diana as punishment for Niobe’s boast that she was superior to their mother, Leto. The first owner of this painting was Prince William Augustus, the Duke of Cumberland, who had crushed ruthlessly the Jacobite Rebellion at the Battle of Culloden in 1746. Though later criticized by Joshua Reynolds, the painting was widely known through a best-selling print and inspired a host of dramatic mythological or historical landscapes by Wilson and other painters including J. M. W. Turner. Gallery label for installation of YCBA collection, 2016