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- Titles Hercules Freeing Prometheus (Proper)
- Artist Nicolas Bertin, French, 1668 - 1736
- Medium oil on canvas
- Dimensions 23 5/8 × 19 7/16 in. (60 × 49,4 cm) frame: 32 × 27 1/2 × 3 1/8 in. (81.3 × 69.9 × 7.9 cm)
- Credit Line Museum purchase with funds provided by Mr. and Mrs. James A. Livingston, Jr.; Martee Woodward Webb; Mr. and Mrs. William M. Spencer III; Catherine Collins; and Mr. and Mrs. George G. Brownell, 1989.29
- Work Type painting
- Classification Paintings
- On View
- Signature Lower right: Bertin
- Inscription On verso, large in white paint: 8 [and] 19 On the top stretcher bar is a white label on which is printed: 106 / 3703
- Provenance Possibly Euzenberg collection [see note 1]. Possibly private collection, Cologne, Germany [see note 2]. Math. Lempertz’sche Kunstversteigerung: Alte Kunst Gemälde Skulpturen, November 19, 1987, lot 19; dealer Patrick Weiller, Paris [see note 3]; purchased by the Birmingham Museum of Art, Alabama, 1989
1. Philippe Malgouyres, Peintures françaises du XVIIe siècle: La collection du musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen (Paris: Somogy, 2000), p. 16. Malgouyres writes, “Notre tableau était jusqu’à présent considéré comme l’esquisse du tableau du Louvre (cf. Lefrançois, 1981) mais un tableau identique au nôtre, signé Bertin, inédit à notre connaissance et d’une qualité bien supérieure, a de grandes chances d’être l’esquisse de Bertin; il se trouvait à Cologne en 1987, puis dans le commerce parisien en 1989 (il s’agit sûrement de celui de la collection Euzenberg, connu par une photographie de la documentation d’Hermann Voss, SED).” In an email dated November 12, 2019 to Virginia Badgett, Philippe explained that "SED" is Service de Documentation du département des peintures du Louvre. When Badgett contacted colleagues at SED to obtain scans of the Hermann Voss photographs, they could not be located. See object file.
2. According to information sheet provided by dealer Patrick Weiller, Paris, in 1989 at the time of purchase. See object file.
3. According to invoice from Patrick Weiller to the Birmingham Museum of Art, dated May 29, 1989. Weiller confirmed 1989.29 was purchased directly from this sale in an email to Virginia Badgett dated November 14, 2019.