The Destruction of the Children of Niobe

Richard Wilson, ca. 1712–1782

1760

Oil on canvas

Yale Center for British Art

The Destruction of the Children of Niobe depicts the mythological punishment of Niobe's children by Apollo and Diana within a stormy landscape. Probably begun while Richard Wilson was in Italy but exhibited after his return to London in the first public exhibition of contemporary art in 1760, The Destruction of the Children of Niobe was a key picture both in Wilson’s career and in the development of landscape painting in Britain. Within a stormy landscape setting that echoes the violence of the mythological episode taking place, the children of Niobe, the proud queen of Thebes, are slain by Apollo and Diana as punishment for Niobe’s boast that she was superior to their mother, Leto. The first owner of this painting was Prince William Augustus, the Duke of Cumberland, who ha