 Etty felt that the work illustrated the moral that women are not chattels , and were entitled to punish men who violated their rights . He made little effort to explain this to his audience , and thus Candaules appeared morally highly ambiguous , inviting the viewer to sympathise either with the sexually immoral Candaules , the murderous Nyssia or the voyeuristic Gyges . From the moment it was unveiled Candaules was condemned as a cynical mix of a distasteful narrative and pornographic images , and there was near @-@ unanimous consensus that it was inappropriate for public exhibition . The piece remained controversial long after Etty 's death ; Alexander Gilchrist 's overwhelmingly flattering 1855 biography of Etty described it as " almost the only instance among Etty 's works , of an undeniably disagreeable , not to say objectionable subject " , while as late as 2011 Sarah Burnage of the University of York wrote of Candaules that " it is perhaps hard to see the painting as anything but a deliberate attempt by the artist to shock and <unk> " . Candaules was bought by wealthy collector Robert Vernon , who was in the process of building a major collection of British art and was to become one of Etty 's most important customers . 
