Prometheus Bound

Cole painted this in 1847, the year before he died, and made it one of the largest canvases of his life. It shows the Titan Prometheus of Greek myth, chained to a peak in the Caucasus as punishment for giving fire to mankind. At first you may not find him, since Cole set the tiny figure so that he almost dissolves into the cold rock. Around him spread desolate snowy mountains under a hard morning sky. Cole was an abolitionist, and some later readers have taken the shackles here as a comment on slavery, though he never said so himself. He left the vast landscape to carry the weight, with the man in it so small that many visitors search a while before they find him at all.