Phryné se rendant aux bains publics en Vénus : Démosthène raillé par Eschine

The Royal Academy had just moved into the new building on Trafalgar Square that it shared with the National Gallery, and Turner, then 63, sent this to the second exhibition held there, in 1838. The long title carries two Athenian stories that have nothing to do with one another. Phryne was a courtesan of the 4th century BC, famous enough to walk to the public baths got up as the goddess Venus. Demosthenes and Aeschines were rival orators who spent years wrecking each other in the law courts. Turner folded both into one imaginary Greek city of gold light and open staircases, with the figures small enough that the argument in the title is hard to find. The canvas came to the nation in 1856 with the rest of his studio, some 300 oil paintings that had never sold.