print
- Museum number
- W,7.157
- Title
-
Object: Democritus and Protagoras
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Series: Houghton Gallery
- Description
-
Democritus standing before Protagoras, looking down at him with outstretched arms, hailing him as a philosopher on seeing him bind a bundle of twigs, thereby making them stronger than a single stick would have been, while Protagoras looks up, holding the bundle on a rock and leaning on it with his left knee to keep them together; with a tree in the background to left, landscape visible over the brow of the hill where they are grouped and two other men turning to watch to right; after Salvator Rosa; etched state. 1768
Etching
- Production date
- 1768 (Published state 1773)
- Dimensions
-
Height: 496 millimetres (trimmed)
-
Width: 363 millimetres (trimmed)
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- Apparently made for the Boydell Houghton Gallery series: the Houghton crest and Boydell's publication line dated 1773 appears in another state, with scratched production details (see W,7.155). A mezzotint version, in reverse, engraved by William Pether, was also published as part of the series (see W,7.154). The Pether is listed by Rubinstein (I.55) but not the Taylor.
For a comment on the Houghton Gallery, see 2005,U.109
David Solkin email July 2023): Although published by Boydell in 1773, Taylor exhibited 'An etching proof from Salvator Rosa' at the Special Society of Artists exhibition in 1768 (no.211). The 'Democritus and Protagoras' is Taylor's only known print after Salvator.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1799
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- W,7.157