Joseph and Potiphar's Wife (Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery), 3rd version

Exhibited at Reading, 1964 (62) when it was in the artist’s possession. Along with The Stoning of St Stephen (1964, untraced) this was a later version oils of the subject, based on Spencer’s Ten Commandments lithographs, commissioned by Robert Gathorne-Hardy in 1927 and published by the Mill House Press in 1934. Spencer’s first version in oils of Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife (1938, untraced, possibly destroyed) was exhibited at the Leicester Galleries in 1939 (no. 15). According to an annotation by Spencer on the lithographic proof, he painted another version in oils in 1947, in reverse from the lithograph, as is the present painting.

Date: 1952
Tags: Biblical, Oil Paintings
Medium: Oil on particle board
Height (mm): 284
Width (mm): 255
Location: Museum of Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington, NZ 1994-0022-6
Exhibition History: Reading 1964 (62)
Provenance: The artist; Bequest of Mary Chamot, 1994