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The painting shows four grotesque dwarfish figures: a hunchbacked man and an old midwife help a woman give birth, producing eggs, while on the left a woman boils a donkey in a cauldron to produce gruel for the mother. In the foreground, babies break out of the eggs: this may be a parody of Leonardo da Vinci's painting of Leda and the swan, in which the offspring of a woman and a swan are born from eggs. The other figures appear to be grotesque parodies of the midwives and other helpers who are shown in the many paintings of the birth of the Virgin Mary. However, they may simply show the people who normally attended the birth of a child in Italy in the seventeenth century. The name of the painter is not known for certain. Pictures of crowds of tiny dwarfs are often attributed to Faustino Bocchi (1659–1741).
Title
A Grotesque Accouchement
Medium
oil on canvas
Measurements
H 64 x W 76 cm
Accession number
44686i
Acquisition method
purchased by Henry S. Wellcome, c.1900–1936
Work type
Painting
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