Art Market Magazine - Visit zone-secure.net

Hubert Robert (1733-1808),
"Fontaine sous un portique",
oil on canvas, 77 x 112 cm.
Estimate: €120,000/150,000.
HD
UPCOMING AUCTIONS THE MAGAZINE
François Boucher
and Hubert Robert
5 April
At Drouot on 5 April, the Paris auction house Beaussant-Lefèvre will be submitting an Old Master painting collection of
excellent quality: firstly because of its provenance (an old French family), and secondly because it is dominated by two
leading figures in the Age of Enlightenment. One is François Boucher, the high priest of romantic scenes with deliciously
plump women. We won't dwell on the numerous distinctions and honours received by the illustrator who
became first painter to the king. Here we have "Le repas de chasse", a painting of a hunting meal from the Paris gallery
Paul Cailleux. We know of three sketches for this subject, which were given to François de Troy and Jean-Paul Oudry;
Oudry's is now in the Musée Nissim de Camondo. This painting was reproduced in the catalogue of the exhibition
"Versailles, les Chasses exotiques de Louis XV" presented in 1996 at the Musée d'Amiens, then at Versailles, when it was
attributed to François Boucher by Xavier Salmon. This Versailles cycle dedicated to hunting was commissioned by
Louis XV for his apartments from the finest artists of the time. The other big name in the second half of the 18th century
was Hubert Robert, who mainly painted landscapes and views of architecture. Here we can admire a fountain beneath
a portico from the former Montbrison collection. The composition is similar to another painting by Hubert Robert with
the same subject, now in the Musée du Louvre: one of 583 paintings bequeathed to the celebrated institution by Louis
La Caze in 1869. The painting in this sale (€150,000/200,000) is larger, and whereas the Louvre version has architecture
behind the colonnade, this one features a lush green landscape. Stéphanie Perris-Delmas
N° 23 I GAZETTE DROUOT INTERNATIONAL
39