Lot Essay
No painting entitled A Helot is recorded, but it seems from the note by Alma-Tadema (see above) that he intended the composition to be engraved on wood and then reproduced four times the size of the drawing in grisaille on canvas, without the figure, possibly as an underpainting for a picture to be completed by himself. Helots were Spartan slaves, and the drawing shows one who has drunk too much and fallen asleep in the street. A mother on the balcony above seizes the opportunity to teach her child a lesson about the evils of drink.
Antistius Labeon: AD 75 (also called A Roman Amateur Artist, A Roman Studio, etc.) was executed in 1874 and is now missing (see Prof. Vern G. Swanson, The Biography and Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 1990, no.174, repr. p.356). The Pyrrhic Dance, the picture which so irritated Ruskin, was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1869 and is now in the Guildhall Art Gallery, London (Swanson, 1990, no.111, repr, p.321).
We are grateful to Professor Vern G. Swanson for his help in preparing this entry.
Antistius Labeon: AD 75 (also called A Roman Amateur Artist, A Roman Studio, etc.) was executed in 1874 and is now missing (see Prof. Vern G. Swanson, The Biography and Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings of Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 1990, no.174, repr. p.356). The Pyrrhic Dance, the picture which so irritated Ruskin, was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1869 and is now in the Guildhall Art Gallery, London (Swanson, 1990, no.111, repr, p.321).
We are grateful to Professor Vern G. Swanson for his help in preparing this entry.