Lot and his daughters are shown fleeing the sinful city of Sodom, forewarned by God of its destruction (Genesis 19). The family are in a moment of conversation, perhaps contemplating their next move. Conspicuously absent are details typically associated with the subject, such as Sodom burning in the background or elements of eroticism, alluding to the daughters' later seduction of their father (an attempt to continue their family’s bloodline). Instead, the trio are fully clothed, sober and chaste.
This painting was made in the aftermath of Reni’s return to Bologna from Rome, where he had lived and worked for more than a decade; the statuesque figures and solid handling of paint are illustrative of the style that he had developed there. Since the mid-seventeenth century, this painting has been regarded as a companion piece to Susannah and the Elders (also in the National Gallery’s collection). Though similar in format and both illustrating moralising tales, the two were painted a few years apart, and were not originally intended as a pair.
The events following the destruction of the sinful city of Sodom, from which Lot and his daughters are here shown fleeing, are recounted in the Old Testament (Genesis 19: 30–38). Forewarned of the city’s demise by God, the trio escaped to the mountain town of Zoar. We see them in a moment of conversation, perhaps contemplating their next move – the daughter on the right raises her right index finger, while her father opens his palm, as if in response, and his other daughter looks on.
Conspicuously absent from Reni’s composition are narrative details typically associated with the subject and common in other seventeenth-century depictions of it: Sodom burning in the background, for example, or Lot’s wife as a pillar of salt (her punishment for disobeying instructions not to look back at the doomed city). Later in the biblical account, the daughters ply their father with alcohol and seduce him, in order to ensure the survival of their family line.
This subject enjoyed renewed popularity in Europe after the Council of Trent, not least because it provided a just, moral context in which to illustrate a social taboo. While many artists seized this as an opportunity to paint a scene rife with eroticism and nudity, Reni deviated from such tradition by illustrating the family as fully clothed, sober and chaste. The monumental figure of Lot in the centre of the composition is not that of a helpless, drunken, old man, but rather a powerful patriarchal figure. The large antique vase held by the daughter on the left, probably filled with wine, and the drapery gathered around the other daughter’s midriff, which makes her appear pregnant, may serve as subtle indicators of the events that were soon to follow.
This painting was made in the aftermath of Reni’s return to Bologna from Rome, where he had lived and worked for more than a decade; the statuesque figures and solid handling of paint are illustrative of the style that he had developed there. The saturated, opaque colours and dark, nondescript background, life-size figures and half-length format may show the influence of Caravaggio, whose style Reni experimented with in the first decade of the seventeenth century. However, the porcelain-like classical features of the daughters are far from stark naturalism introduced by Caravaggio, as are the pale pastel tones in the drapery of the daughter on the right – colours which would come to dominate Reni’s paintings in the decades that followed.
Since the mid-seventeenth century, this painting has been regarded as a companion piece to Susannah and the Elders. Though similar in format and both illustrating moralising tales, the two pictures were painted several years apart, and were not originally intended as a pair. This work is first recorded in the Palazzo Lancellotti, Rome, in 1640, where it hung alongside Susannah and the Elders until the paintings were respectively acquired by the National Gallery in 1844. Its earlier history is unknown.
