Die Auffindung des Moses

By the 1630s the Italian painter Orazio Gentileschi was living in London, an unusual thing for a man from Pisa, brought over to work for the court of King Charles I. This huge canvas was almost certainly the king's gift to his French queen, Henrietta Maria, made to mark the birth of their son and heir, the future Charles II. The subject suits the occasion, an infant boy, Moses, lifted safely from the river by a princess and her women. Gentileschi dresses them not as ancient Egyptians but as elegant ladies of his own day, in shimmering satins, the tallest in a great yellow gown. It first hung in the Queen's House at Greenwich, beside the Thames. After nearly 20 years on loan, the National Gallery bought it in 2019.