© National Gallery, London
Ovid described how Actaeon accidentally came upon Diana naked, while out hunting and was changed by her into a stag and killed by his own hounds.
The treatment of the landscape, which was always greatly admired, is of a freedom which was not fully achieved again until the 19th century. Purchased after a successful public appeal by the gallery.
Provenance
Painted for Phillip II of Spain, but not know if it ever reached the King; Archduke Leopold William, Brussels; Queen Christina of Sweden; Dukes of Orleans, Paris; Sir Abraham Hume; the Earls of Brownlow; the Earls of Harewood; Christie's; J.Paul Gett