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LONDON, Nov 20, 2006 (UPI via COMTEX) -- Two halves of a painting by English master Francis Hayman have been reunited some 300 years after the tormented man cut his wife out of the couple's portrait.
The Independent reported Monday the two halves of Hayman's 1735 portrait of himself and his wife have now been reunited and can be viewed at a London gallery after "a chance discovery by an art dealer."
Hayman, who died in 1776, was one of the founding members of the Royal Academy and began his art career as a scene painter in London's Drury Lane theaters.
Hayman, The Independent said, had nearly completed the portrait when his marriage went sour. Wanting no memory of his wife, the 27-year-old painter cut the canvas into two parts. The partition left parts of Hayman's legs missing on the canvas -- something that always perplexed art experts who called the piece "badly composed."
Exeter art dealer Philip Mould solved the conundrum when he bought the "lost" half, titled "Circle of Hogarth," at an auction in rural New Hampshire. He is showing the reassembled painting, including whole legs and wife, at his gallery in Mayfair.
URL: www.upi.com Copyright 2006 by United Press International
