Oil paint on canvas
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/william-holman-hunt-287" aria-label="More by William Holman Hunt" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">William Holman Hunt</a>
Triumph Innocents
Presented by Sir John Middlemore Bt 1918
adults
animals: mammals
baby
Bible: New Testament
bubble
children
Christ
donkey
exile
family
family
Flight into Egypt
government and politics
halo
Holy Family
landscape
man
Massacre of the Innocents
Matthew, chapter 2
mysticism
natural phenomena
night
people
religion and belief
riding
Saints
society
spirit
St Joseph
times of the day
transport: land
universal religious imagery
Virgin Mary
woman
wooded
<p>Hunt began painting this subject while on a visit to the Holy Land in the 1870s. It shows Mary, Joseph and infant Jesus escaping to Egypt as King Herod kills all the first-born males or 'innocents' in Bethlehem, described in The Gospel of Matthew, 2: 16-18. Hunt originally intended to show just the Holy Family, but he later decided to add the martyred innocents. The Holy Family are surrounded by the spirits of the children slain by Herod. Hunt wanted the bubbles, or ‘airy globes’ which accompany the procession, to convey a sense of the waves of ‘the streams of eternal life’.</p><p><b>From a letter from William Holman Hunt to William Bell Scott, 5 January, 1880, reproduced in W. Minto (ed), Autobiographical Notes of the Life of William Bell Scott, vol 2, 1892</b></p><p>The beings I want to represent really differ in this, that they have only just left this life instead of having got altogether established as celestial creatures. Some of them, if not all, may indeed scarcely have altogether lost the last warmth of mortal life. It seems desirable, therefore, to avoid a treatment which would make them like the angels who regard the face of our Father in heaven. A support to this view I find also in the desirability of avoiding to distinctly pronounce the figures to be either subjective or objective. I wish to avoid positively declaring them to be more than a vision to the Virgin conjured up by her maternal love for her own child, the Saviour, who is to be calling her attention to them.</p><p><em>Gallery label, March 2010</em></p>
painting oil paint canvas
11 October 2008 – 6 September 2009
2009-09-06
11 October 2008 – 11 January 2009
2009-01-11
2008-10-11
Manchester Art Gallery (Manchester, UK)
http://www.manchestergalleries.org
2008-10-11
Holman Hunt and the Pre-Raphaelite Vision
Loan-out
18 August 2009 – 14 November 2010
2010-11-14
18 August 2009 – 14 November 2010
2010-11-14
2009-08-18
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2009-08-18
Sublime
Collection based display
4 November 2011 – 30 September 2012
2012-09-30
4 November 2011 – 29 January 2012
2012-01-29
2011-11-04
Tate Liverpool (Liverpool, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/liverpool/
25 February 2012 – 3 June 2012
2012-06-03
2012-02-25
Museo di Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto (Rovereto, Italy)
http://www.mart.trento.it
23 June 2012 – 30 September 2012
2012-09-30
2012-06-23
Hamburger Kunsthalle (Hamburg, Germany)
http://www.hamburger-kunsthalle.de
2011-11-04
Alice in Wonderland
Exhibition
8 June 2021 – 14 January 2024
2024-01-14
12 July 2023 – 2 October 2023
2023-10-02
2023-07-12
National Art Center (Tokyo, Japan)
26 October 2023 – 14 January 2024
2024-01-14
2023-10-26
Nakanoshima Museum of Art (Osaka, Japan)
2021-06-08
Light
Tate partnerships & programmes
The Triumph of the Innocents
support: 1562 × 2540 mm
frame: 2208 × 3175 × 125 mm
Presented by Sir John Middlemore Bt 1918
<p>Hunt began painting this subject while on a visit to the Holy Land in the 1870s. It shows Mary, Joseph and infant Jesus escaping to Egypt as King Herod kills all the first-born males or 'innocents' in Bethlehem, described in The Gospel of Matthew, 2: 16-18. Hunt originally intended to show just the Holy Family, but he later decided to add the martyred innocents. The Holy Family are surrounded by the spirits of the children slain by Herod. Hunt wanted the bubbles, or ‘airy globes’ which accompany the procession, to convey a sense of the waves of ‘the streams of eternal life’. 
<br/>
<br/><b>From a letter from William Holman Hunt to William Bell Scott, 5 January, 1880, reproduced in W. Minto (ed), Autobiographical Notes of the Life of William Bell Scott, vol 2, 1892</b>
<br/>
<br/>The beings I want to represent really differ in this, that they have only just left this life instead of having got altogether established as celestial creatures. Some of them, if not all, may indeed scarcely have altogether lost the last warmth of mortal life. It seems desirable, therefore, to avoid a treatment which would make them like the angels who regard the face of our Father in heaven. A support to this view I find also in the desirability of avoiding to distinctly pronounce the figures to be either subjective or objective. I wish to avoid positively declaring them to be more than a vision to the Virgin conjured up by her maternal love for her own child, the Saviour, who is to be calling her attention to them. 
<br/>
<br/></p>

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2010-03-31T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
adults animals: mammals baby Bible: New Testament bubble children Christ donkey exile family family Flight into Egypt government and politics halo Holy Family landscape man Massacre of the Innocents Matthew, chapter 2 mysticism natural phenomena night people religion and belief riding Saints society spirit St Joseph times of the day transport: land universal religious imagery Virgin Mary woman wooded