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Identification and Creation

Object Number
1943.213
People
George Frederic Watts, British (London, England 1817 - 1904 Limnerslease, Compton, England)
Title
Ariadne
Other Titles
Alternate Title: Ariadne in Naxos / Deserted by Theseus
Classification
Paintings
Work Type
painting
Date
1888-1890
Culture
British
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/230038

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
126.4 x 101.6 cm (49 3/4 x 40 in.)
framed: 146.1 x 121.4 cm (57 1/2 x 47 13/16 in.)
Inscriptions and Marks
  • Signed: l.c.: G. F. Watts 1890

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History
Leopold Hirsch, 1890, sold [through his sale, Christie's, London, May 11, 1934, lot 80]; to [Fine Art Society PLC, London. Sir Edmund Davis, sold [through Christie's, London, July 7, 1939] [via Martin Birnbaum]; to Grenville Lindall Winthrop, New York, bequest; to Fogg Art Museum, 1943

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Bequest of Grenville L. Winthrop
Accession Year
1943
Object Number
1943.213
Division
European and American Art
Contact
am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Publication History

  • "G.F. Watts: framing myths and portraits", website, The Frame Blog, https://theframeblog.com/2020/05/12/g-f-watts-framing-myths-and-portraits/ [accessed May 14, 2020]
  • "The New Gallery, Regent Street", Athenaeum (May 3 1890), p. 577, p. 577
  • A. G. Temple, The Art of Painting in the Queen's Reign (London, England, 1897), p. 169
  • Hugh Macmillan, The Life-work of George Frederick Watts, R. A., J. M. Dent & Co./E. P. Dutton & Co. (London, England and New York, NY, 1903), pp. 134-135
  • W. K. West and R. Pantini, G. F. Watts (London and New York, 1904), pl. 17
  • Mary S. Watts, Catalogue of the Works of G. F. Watts Compiled by His Widow, Watts Gallery (Compton, Surrey, England, c. 1910), vol. II, p. 7
  • Mary S. Watts, George Frederic Watts: the Annals of an Artist's Life, The Macmillan Company (London, England, 1912), vol. I, p. 283
  • Important Pictures...The Property of the Late Leopold Hirsch, auct. cat., Christie's, London (London, England, May 11 1934), no. 80
  • Important Ancient and Modern Pictures...Property of the Late Sir Edmund Davis, auct. cat., Christie's, London (London, England, July 7, 1939), no. 94
  • Paintings and Drawings of the Pre-Raphaelites and their Circle, exh. cat., Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA, 1946), no. 101
  • David Loshak, George Frederic Watts, O.M., R.A., 1817-1904, exh. cat. (London, 1955), under nos. 62 and 133
  • Caroline Houser, Dionysos and His Circle: Ancient Through Modern, exh. cat., Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, 1979), no. 70
  • Edgar Peters Bowron, European Paintings Before 1900 in the Fogg Art Museum: A Summary Catalogue including Paintings in the Busch-Reisinger Museum, Harvard University Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 1990), p. 133; repr. as no. 77
  • Francesca Mitchell, "Technical Study of the Paintings by George Frederic Watts in the Collection at the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University" (thesis (certificate in conservation), Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies, July 1990), Unpublished, pp. 1-22 passim
  • Chikashi Kitazaki and Mina Oya, ed., Between Reality and Dreams: Nineteenth Century British and French Art from the Winthrop Collection of the Fogg Art Museum, exh. cat., National Museum of Western Art (Ueno, 2002), pp. 72-73, cat. #4, color repr.
  • Stephan Wolohojian, ed., A Private Passion: 19th-Century Paintings and Drawings from the Grenville L. Winthrop Collection, Harvard University, exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Yale University Press (U.S.) (New York, 2003), no. 196, pp. 437-439, repr. in color
  • Stephan Wolohojian, Ingres, Burne-Jones, Whistler, Renoir... La Collection Grenville L. Winthrop, exh. cat., Musée des Beaux-Arts de Lyon and Réunion des Musées Nationaux (Paris, France, 2003), no. 196, pp. 450-451, repr. in color
  • Katharine Baetjer, British Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1575-1875, Metropolitan Museum of Art / Yale University Press (New Haven, CT and London, England, 2010), pp. 273-274, ill. p. 274

Exhibition History

  • Annual Summer Exhibition, New Gallery, London, 05/01/1890 - 09/01/1890
  • Winter Exhibition: Works by the Late George Frederick Watts, R.A., O.M. and the Late Frederick Sandys, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 10/01/1905 - 12/31/1905
  • Paintings and Drawings of the Pre-Raphaelites and their Circle, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 04/08/1946 - 06/01/1946
  • Pre-Raphaelite and Early French Symbolist Art in the Fogg Collections, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 01/16/1973 - 02/25/1973
  • Dionysos and His Circle: Ancient through Modern, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 12/10/1979 - 02/10/1980
  • Between Reality and Dreams: Nineteenth Century British and French Art from the Winthrop Collection of the Fogg Art Museum, National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, 09/14/2002 - 12/08/2002
  • A Private Passion: 19th-Century Paintings and Drawings from the Grenville L. Winthrop Collection, Harvard University, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 10/23/2003 - 01/25/2004
  • For Students of Art and Lovers of Beauty: Highlights from the Collection of Grenville L. Winthrop, Harvard University Art Museums, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 04/16/2004

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Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of European and American Art at am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu