Research confirms that Samson and Delilah is a Rubens
This extensive study, conducted by our curatorial and scientific teams using the latest imaging and analytical techniques, provides compelling evidence in support of the painting's authorship. It offers transparency around our research process and contributes meaningfully to the wider field of art-historical scholarship.
Given the interest and debate this painting has attracted over the years, we hope this publication will be of value to scholars and the public alike.Gabriele FinaldiDirector, the National Gallery
Have an opinion on anything you've read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Daily Mail
18 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Jurassic Park star Sam Neill reveals his son repeatedly FARTED on Princess Diana at legendary film's premiere
Sam Neill has revealed his son repeatedly farted on Princess Diana at Jurassic Park's premiere in London. The actor, 77, starred in the smash-hit movie franchise, which catapulted him to international fame thanks to his role as Dr Alan Grant. Back in 1993, Princess Diana attended a royal screening of the original movie, which took place in Leicester Square. However, Sam has recalled his mortification when he discovered his son Tim began farting during the film - just meters from the princess. He said: 'The last time I watched it in its totality was sitting beside Princess Di at the Leicester Square at the London opening. 'On the other side of me was my son Tim - he was 11 and completely swept away by it, but about the time the T-Rex turns up, Tim started to fart. 'And the draft was drifting across me to royalty! 'I spent the whole film in a muck sweat, thinking, "Princess Di is being exposed to the horrors of a little boy's fart, but she's going to think it's me. I am going to be subliminally blamed for my son's crimes, and I don't think she'll talk to me afterwards." 'But she was well brought up and never mentioned it.' Sam previously told GQ how the princess enjoyed the sci-fi and action movie, and said he kept one eye on the screen and the other on her. To date, a whopping seven films in the Jurassic franchise, with the latest instalment Jurassic World Rebirth released just last month. It stars Scarlett Johansson, Mahershala Ali, Jonathan Bailey, Rupert Friend, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo and Ed Skrein. Meanwhile, Sam looked well and in good spirits as he stepped out for a red carpet event in February. He attended the 2025 AACTA Awards held at Home of the Arts (HOTA) on the Gold Coast, in Australia. Sam previously opened up about his 'brutal' chemotherapy treatment after being diagnosed with stage-three blood cancer. He found out he had cancer in 2022 during his first trip back to New Zealand after lockdowns made returning home to see his family virtually impossible for two years. His son Tim told Australian Story his dad had been back in New Zealand for barely an hour when a doctor phoned with the awful news he had cancer. 'When he hung the phone up and we sat down, and we had a little bit of a cry together. It was supposed to be a happy day. He didn't get to stay,' Tim said. Sam continued: 'I was in really a fight for my life. And everything was a new world and a rather alarming world. 'I had three or four months of reasonably conventional chemotherapies which are, brutal.'
The Guardian
20 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Aussie dots, Tudor pots and nudist shots – the week in art
Emily Kam KngwarrayA survey of this revered Australian painter who combined modern abstraction with maps of the Dreamtime. Tate Modern, London, 10 July until 11 January Lindsey Mendick: Wicked Game The flamboyant ceramicist takes a dive into the world of the Tudors with an installation in a castle once visited by Elizabeth I. Kenilworth Castle, Warwickshire, 9 July until 31 October Figure + GroundMartin Creed, Sonia Boyce, Paul McCarthy and more in a group show of film and video art. Hauser and Wirth, London, until 2 August Movements for Staying AliveYvonne Rainer, Ana Mendieta and Harold Offeh star in a participatory celebration of body art. Modern Art Oxford, until 7 September Małgorzata Mirga-TasThis Roma-Polish artist portrays her community in bold and colourful textiles. Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester, until 7 September It's a marvellous night for a moondance – with the pink dolphins tripping the light fantastic with the local mermaids – in the Amazon. Peruvian artist Santiago Yahuarcani creates his works by applying paint prepared from pigments, seeds, leaves and roots, to large sheets of llanchama, a cloth made from the bark of the ojé tree. His works are often inspired by the hallucinations brought on by the ritual ingestion of tobacco, coca, ayahuasca and mushrooms – substances long used by the Indigenous peoples of the Amazon when in search of help, knowledge or revelation. His show, The Beginning of Knowledge is at the Whitworth, Manchester, as part of Manchester International festival. Read our interview with him here. Sam Cox AKA Mr Doodle is the million-dollar artist who almost lost himself to his alter ego Not all statues of footballers are as terrible as the infamous Ronaldo bust Jenny Saville's raw, visceral portraits are inspiring a fresh generation of schoolkids Indigenous art from around the world is sweeping galleries across the UK A once derelict district of Medellín, Colombia has has been rebuilt as a green haven Khaled Sabsabi will show at Venice Biennale after controversial sacking was rescinded An Allegory, by an anonymous Florentine artist, about 1500 This painting celebrates childbirth and motherhood, but subversively. Mothers were often depicted as the Virgin Mary nursing Christ in medieval and Renaissance art. It was a form of religious manipulation, associating a typical female experience of the age with piety and love of Christ. This woman however lies powerfully and calmly in a meadow while her babies play around her. It is a pagan scene, shorn of Christian symbols. In a pose apparently inspired by Botticelli's Venus and Mars, a strong, even divine maternal figure, who resembles Venus, holds sway over the onlooker. National Gallery If you don't already receive our regular roundup of art and design news via email, please sign up here. If you have any questions or comments about any of our newsletters please email newsletters@
The Guardian
20 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Digested week: Wimbledon joy and the canny PR of the Dalai Lama
As someone who enjoys the women's tennis at Wimbledon, so to speak, the tournament's opening days are an annual joy and this week has been electric. Emma Raducanu leads the rise in British women powering up the world rankings, which makes the era of women's tennis I grew up in – I have a lot of time for Jo Durie, but those were hard years – seem like the 19th century. Today, after two stunning opening-round matches, Raducanu will meet Aryna Sabalenka, the mighty Belarusian world number one, which means tomorrow I will be on court one (in the park) knocking imaginary clay dust from my shoes and pretending to be in the final. If the tennis is sublime, the crowd so far has been slightly under par – although it's early days. Last year, the title of Wimbledon best dressed went for my money to Greta Gerwig, in a tan suit the provenance of which I still can't track down, as well as Zendaya in Ralph Lauren and Julia Roberts in Gucci. This week in the royal box and around the grounds we've had Cate Blanchett, who is welcome in any setting, Olivia Rodrigo and Russell Crowe, who combed his hair and dug out a tie for Centre Court. (Esquire ran a story about the £65,000 Rolex he was wearing, which if it was intended to set us against him, won't work – I won't hear a word against Rusty.) There were also, as usual, a high turn out of what my teenage tennis partner and I used to refer to nastily as Midweek Ladies, a crowd who, off-court, wear floral, ankle length dresses in pale shades and on court, are always one double fault away from losing their nerve and reverting to an underhand serve. Everyone should watch My Mom Jayne, the documentary about Jayne Mansfield made by her daughter Mariska Hargitay, released this week on HBO Max and a jaw-dropper of revelations and sadness. You may know Hargitay from her role as Detective Olivia Benson in Law & Order: SVU – I didn't even know she was Mansfield's daughter – and she was three years old in 1967 when her 34-year-old mother was killed in a car crash outside New Orleans. The film is heartbreaking, not least because Hargitay, who has no memories of her mother, was in the car with her siblings when it crashed. All three children survived and were raised by their father, but as Hargitay reports, she grew up feeling vaguely ashamed of her mother, a Hollywood sex bomb who spoke in a breathy voice that a generation later fell out of usage. As Hargitary digs into the history of the mother she never knew, she discovers Mansfield was an accomplished pianist and violinist, a brilliant, ambitious woman trapped by the only persona Hollywood allowed her – until now. Finally, someone has greeted the release of a new Brad Pitt movie not with praise-be gratitude for America's ageing sweetheart, but by looking at Pitt's success in shrugging off an allegation of domestic abuse. While in most of the entertainment press, Pitt's new film is treated to the customary chuckling puff piece, New York magazine runs the headline Brad Pitt is Fooling You and proceeds to get into it: the actor's image preservation, the crisis management PR he retains (former client: Johnny Depp) and the details of Angelina Jolie's allegation that he assaulted her and one of their children on a private plane. As the piece concludes, nobody cares. There's been a vibe shift since #MeToo, which let's not forget, Brad Pitt's production company, Plan B, aligned itself with by co-producing the movie adaptation of She Said, about the exposing of Harvey Weinstein – a sterling piece of allyship from America's most sensitive male feminist, or something else entirely. Either way, nothing sticks. In the last five years, the worst coverage Pitt has had is for Bullet Train. There was a story in the Sun mid-week about Pitt's ex, Jennifer Anniston, or rather, about a 43-year-old man from Southampton who believed himself to be in a Facebook relationship with the Hollywood star, who had reached out to him asking for a loan. That might have been your first clue, Paul, that something about this – hard to put your finger on what exactly – didn't smell right. It wasn't the first time the unfortunate victim had been targeted over social media by scam accounts claiming to be Hollywood stars. But when 'Jennifer Anniston' sent him a copy of her driving license, along with the message 'I love you', it was enough to clinch things and convince the hapless Facebook user he was at the start of a beautiful relationship. As requested, he sent the former Friends star the £200 of Apple gift cards she was asking for and never heard from her again. Oh, to have the confidence of the Dalai Lama that we'll all get a second go-around at this. Ahead of his 90th birthday this weekend, the Tibetan spiritual leader discussed arrangements for his successor, by which, per Buddhist beliefs, he means the body into which he will be reincarnated. This is as much a political as a spiritual consideration and in his address, the Dalai Lama pushed back against the Chinese government's insistence on preapproving the reincarnation, remaining firm that when the time comes, he'll be reincarnated in line with Tibetan tradition and with no interference from Beijing. He has also dangled some spoilers, suggesting, tantalisingly, that the new Dalai Lama may not be a baby, as he was, and – in what would represent a reboot more shocking than the new Dr Who and Ghostbusters combined – may not even be male. Which goes to show that even spiritual leaders these days have a canny knack for PR.
