Sir Edward John Poynter, PRA, RWS

(British, 1836-1919)

The Cup of Tantalus

Footnotes

Provenance
Private collection, Canada.

Exhibited
London, Royal Academy, 1905, no. 222.

Literature
'Second Show Sunday: Academicians and Associates', The Morning Post, 3 April 1905, p. 5.
'Art', Nottingham Daily Express, 4 April 1905, p. 4.
'The Royal Academy Exhibition', Edinburgh Evening News, 29 April 1905, p. 6.
'The Royal Academy: Summer Exhibition: Private View', The Morning Post, 29 April 1905, pp. 7–8.
'The Royal Academy Exhibition', The Scotsman, 29 April 1905, p. 9.
'The Royal Academy (First Notice)', The Times, 29 April 1905, p. 14
Marion Harry Spielmann, Royal Academy Pictures 1905, London, 1905, part 1, p. ii.
'Fine Arts: The Royal Academy (First Notice)', Athenaeum, 6 May 1905, pp. 567–68.
O. M. H., 'The Royal Academy (First Notice)', Black and White, 6 May 1905, pp. 629–32.
'The Royal Academy', Country Life, 6 May 1905, pp. 619–20.
'The Royal Academy, 1905', The Graphic, 6 May 1905, p. 1.
W. M., 'The Royal Academy: l', Illustrated London News, 6 May 1905, p.648.
F. J. M., 'The Royal Academy: I', The Speaker, 6 May 1905, pp. 141–42.
'The World of Art: [Royal] Academy—Second Notice', The Queen, 13 May 1905, p. 751.
'The Royal Academy', The Times of India [Mumbai], 20 May 1905, p. 12.
'Royal Academy: Third Notice', The Daily Telegraph, 29 May 1905, p. 11.
A. C. R. Carter, 'The Royal Academy', The Art Journal, June 1905, pp. 165–76.
A. L. Baldry, 'The Royal Academy Exhibition, 1905', The Studio, June 1905, pp. 37–51.
'Further Notes on Royal Academy Pictures', The Builder, 3 June 1905, pp. 591–92.
B. S., 'Fine Art: The Royal Academy (Second Notice)', The Academy, 17 June 1905, p. 640.
L. M. Richter, 'A Last Visit to the Galleries', Westminster Review, August 1905, pp. 191–94.

Illustrated
M. H. Spielmann, Royal Academy Pictures 1905, London 1905, part 1, frontispiece.
'Royal Academy Pictures, 1905', The Sketch, 3 May 1905, p. 3.
O. M. H., 'The Royal Academy (First Notice)', Black and White, 6 May 1905, p. 629.
'Pictures from the Royal Academy: Representative Works', Illustrated London News, 6 May 1905, p. i.
'The Royal Academy, 1905', The Graphic, 6 May 1905, p. 2.
R. B. L. S., 'Special Supplement to 'The Sphere': The Royal Academy Exhibition Summer, 1905', The Sphere, 6 May 1905, p. i.
A. C. R. Carter, 'The Royal Academy', The Art Journal, June 1905, p. 167.
'As the Fruit and the Water that Retreated before Tantalus', Illustrated London News, 18 June 1910, p. 984.

The Cup of Tantalus is the largest of four works by Poynter shown at the Royal Academy of Arts in 1905; the others were a female portrait and two landscape watercolours, A Surrey Chalk-pit and Autumn Leaves. He had until recently jointly held the positions of President of the Royal Academy and Director of the National Gallery, London. He had resigned from the latter in 1904.

The present work makes a playful allusion to the ancient Greek myth of Tantalus, the legendary king of Lydia. He was condemned to the underworld of Hades and made to stand up to his chin in a pool water, but only to have the water recede each time he attempted to drink. Here, Poynter has set the myth in the lavish garden of the Villa d'Este on Lake Como, Italy where he frequently visited. One of the two female figures above a fountain stretches down to reach a cup held up from below by a companion on tiptoe, but it is almost out of reach. The critic from the Edinburgh Evening News thought the stretching companion on the left a 'beautifully drawn figure, lithe and graceful.' One of Poynter's many drawings for this figure was reproduced full-page in the book of his drawings by Malcolm Bell, published in 1905.¹ Italy had recently inspired the subject of two watercolours from 1898 by Poynter, Isola San Giulio, Lago d'Orta (Yale Center for British Art, New Haven), and The Approaching Storm, Lake of Orta (British Museum, London).

The painting was first shown to the press and critics in the weeks leading to the opening of the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition on 1 May 1905. This was in the studio at his home on The Avenue, Fulham Road, Chelsea. Critics from across the country wrote up the picture for their readers eager to learn what the head of the institution would submit. The picture was regarded as his most important submission into which Poynter, stated the Nottingham Daily Express, had 'woven some exquisite scenic surroundings.' Indeed, it was the landscape of the genre picture that was most admired. The critic of The Builder noted that the work was 'full of little incidents—the flecking of sunlight through the trees, the distant city on a hill, seen across the bay.' Poynter had long painted works that combined archaeological artefacts from the historical record (usually in museums) with anecdotal incident, to form historical genre subjects, and continued to produce these into the twentieth century. In The Cup of Tantalus he was considered 'at his best' in this usual vein (thought the Illustrated London News), and the work was shown in the same gallery as Lawrence Alma-Tadema's The Finding of Moses (1904; Private Collection). Despite the essentially playful aspect of the work, it does incorporate a portion of a bas-relief from the Villa Quintiliana in Rome, which the artist knew in the British Museum and which he had 'inserted' as a focus for the composition, and in keeping with the title's allusion to mythology. The marble bas-relief depicting a Bacchic procession, and dating to around AD 100, was part of the celebrated Townley Collection, and had been in Bloomsbury since 1805.² Poynter was familiar with many aspects of the rich and extensive archaeological collections of the British Museum. Carter, writing in The Art Journal, admired Poynter's 'erudition, research and connoisseurship' evidenced in the work and the study he must have undertaken at resources like the British Museum. Poynter, in common with other artists of his generation such as Leighton and Alma-Tadema, often adapted archaeological artefacts by re-configuring their meaning and context. It was their incorporation and 'use' that was important and gendered added interest. Indeed, the critic from The Queen thought Poynter was 'scholarly as ever.'

The early history of the painting is both fascinating and remarkable, and evidence of the continued influence and agency of art unions into the twentieth century. The picture was sold from Poynter's studio during its first public viewing in the weeks before its debut at the Royal Academy. On 18 April 1905 it was purchased by the newspaper News of the World for 600 guineas. It subsequently organised a nationwide campaign, through the National Art Union, for the competition for various art prizes, the first prize of which was the present lot. Coupons were collected by avid readers of the News of the World between 23 April and 6 August 1905.³ Advertisements for the competition were printed in the regional press, including Birmingham Daily Mail, Liverpool Echo, and Yorkshire Evening Post. The winner of the first prize was a bricklayer, Charles Henry Tuck, from Crowborough, Sussex.

¹M. Bell, Drawings of Sir E. J. Poynter, Bart., PRA, 1905, plate 19.
²British Museum, London (GR 1805,0703.128).
³The Daily Telegraph, 22 April 1905, p. 3.

We are grateful to Dr. Donato Esposito for compiling this catalogue entry.