Hercules Wrestling with Death for the Body of Alcestis
Photogravure, published by The Fine Art Society Ltd, dated February 1, 1897. On chine laid on thick white wove paper with full margins, image 376 x 746 mm, chine 462 x 805 mm, platemark 480 x 825 mm, sheet 668 x 1017 mm. Possibly an “India proof” with the copyright notice lower center below the image and publication credit upper right above the image, otherwise without lettering. Three or four small clean tears on edge of sheet (restored), negligible foxing on outer margins, otherwise fine condition, the chine bright and the impression brilliant.
This photogravure is listed in An alphabetical list of engravings declared at the office of the Printsellers' Association, London… compiled by the secretary, G.W. Friend…, vol. 2 [n.p.] (London, 1885-1912) as a Goupil-gravure printed by Boussod, Valadon & Co., 29-1/2 x 14-3/4 in., declared by The Fine Art Society Ltd. on March 23, 1897 in an edition of 125 Artist’s Proofs, 25 Presentation Proofs and unlimited ordinary prints. While this impression does not bear a blindstamp, the PSA rules required the printing of all proofs before the plate was lettered with the title and artist’s name and proscribed any subsequent erasure or masking of letters. Accordingly, this impression would be a proof printed before the further lettering of the plate.
Leighton’s painting of Hercules Wrestling, now in the Wadsworth Atheneum, was exhibited at the Royal Academy in May, 1871 (no. 215) and was bought from the Liverpool Autumn Exhibition of the same year (no. 193) by Sir Bernhard Samuelson. Leighton died in January 1896 and was given a memorial exhibition by The Fine Arts Society the following December and January. Samuelson then facilitated a wide exhibition tour of Hercules Wrestling, and the publication of the photogravure by The Fine Arts Society may have been integral to these activities. Too, Leighton believed that the best way to reproduce pictures was by photographs (Leighton letter to T.C. Horsfall, Manchester Art Museum, August 18, 1890, at Barrington, Life (1906), vol. 2, pp. 276-9). Boussod, Valadon & Co., the printers of this sheet, were successors to Goupil et Cie., which had pioneered the refinement of the woodburytype process for making high quality photogravure prints. Given the lead time required for producing an ambitious plate by the Goupil method, it is conceivable that Leighton may have had involvement in the Hercules Wrestling photogravure project before his death.
For the confrontation of life and death in Hercules Wrestling, Leighton took, according to Barrington (vol. 2, p. 190), the lines from Euripedes as his text: “There slept a silent palace in the sun, / With plains adjacent and Thessalian peace…. Yea, I will go and lie in wait for Death, the king of souls departed, with the dusky robes, and methinks I shall find him hard by the grave drinking the sacrificial wine. And if I can seize him by this ambush, springing from my lair, and throw my arms in circle round him, none shall snatch his panting body from my grasp until he give back the woman to me.” Several studies for the painting in the Leighton House collection, including the wrestling figure of Hercules, the recumbent Alcestis and the drapery for the phantom figure of death, show not only Leighton’s depth in classical sources but his personal absorption in the Alcestis legend.
We offer this impression unmounted, together with a substantial grey-green washed-oak frame of appropriate size and proportions (overall 87 x 125 x 9.5 cm), but unframed. We will assist the purchaser in completing the mounting and glazing, at purchaser’s cost.
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Price: $2,300
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