LA ODISEA DEL HIJO PRÓDIGO: EL CASO DE ALFREDO VALENZUELA PUELMA Y GEORGES TRUFFAUT

Abstract

This article analyzes the work of the Chilean painter Alfredo Valenzuela Puelma, entitled The Prodigal Son, which has received little mention and has occupied a marginal place among local art historians in relation to the artist’s pictorial repertoire. Based on this situation, an iconographic analysis of elements considered secondary in its official interpretation was carried out, questioning its identity as The Prodigal Son and proposing, instead, a new reading based on the Homeric texts. The new identity of the painting, interpreted as “Telemachus recognizing Ulysses”, not only provides a reading that incorporates the elements iconographically ignored in its interpretation as The Prodigal Son, but also provides background that links the work to the French painter Georges Truffaut. In this way, it was possible to identify the painting as a copy of a work by the French artist in 1880, and also provided new information on one of the most mentioned facets of Valenzuela Puelma, although there are few examples of it: that of copyist.