Pierre Subleyras, 'Diana and Endymion', about 1740.
London, The National Gallery.

Recent Acquisition

'Diana and Endymion'

about 1740

Pierre Subleyras
(1699-1749)

NG6592

This rare and beautiful painting by the French 18th-century artist Pierre Subleyras has been allocated to the National Gallery by HM Government under the Acceptance-in-Lieu scheme. It was formerly in the collection of the late Sir Brinsley Ford (1908-1999) who was a Trustee of the National Gallery from 1954 until 1961, and whose executors expressed the wish that the Gallery should have the painting.

The subject of Diana and Endymion, derived from various ancient sources, was frequently painted. The shepherd Endymion, renowned for his beauty, was sent to sleep forever at Jupiter's command in return for the gift of eternal youth. In another version of the tale and that on which this painting is based, it was the moon goddess Selene, with whom Diana became identified, who sent him to eternal sleep so that she might embrace him unobserved.

'Diana and Endymion', painted around 1740, belongs to Subleyras's mature Roman period when he was at the height of his powers and widely recognised as one of Rome's leading artists.

Subleyras was born in Southern France and trained first in Toulouse and then in Paris. He won the Prix de Rome in 1727 and went there the following year, where he remained for the rest of his life.

He produced many portraits and religious pictures but 'Diana and Endymion' is one of his rare mythological subjects. In its elegance and restraint it is marked by a French sensibility to the art of Rome, and in its tender melancholy it appears influenced by the earlier mythological paintings of Poussin.

The Gallery's collection has examples of just this type of work by Poussin - 'The Nurture of Bacchus' and 'Cephalus and Aurora' - to which Subleyras's painting is such a haunting response. It is a fine example of French 18th-century history painting as well as a painting of exceptional poetic feeling.

Oil on canvas 73.5 x 99cm

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