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alb3612388 Christ Carrying the Cross. Artist: Pierre Mignard (French, Troyes 1612-1695 Paris). Dimensions: 17 1/2 x 22 15/16 in. (44.5 x 58.2 cm). Date: ca. 1684.After first training with the mannerist painter Jean Boucher de Bourges at the age of twelve, Pierre Mignard entered Vouet's studio in Paris in 1630, where he would stay until 1634, before leaving for Rome the year after. In a sojourn that lasted over twenty years, Mignard studied the works of the masters of the High Renaissance and the Carracci school and developed his natural facility for portraiture. In the second half of the 17th century, he would become one of the most significant protagonists of classicism in France, his elegantly crafted history paintings reflecting the influence of his extended stay in Italy. After engaging for decades in a fierce rivalry with Charles Le Brun, the death in 1683 of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Le Brun's backer, cleared the way for Mignard to receive royal commissions. Mignard was finally granted the positions of Premier Peintre and director of the Académie royale following Le Brun's death in 1690. This highly detailed compositional study is for Mignard's Christ Carrying the Cross (Musée du Louvre, Paris). Completed in 1684, the canvas was widely acclaimed by contemporary writers and entered the collection of Louis XIV as a gift of Colbert's son, the Marquis de Seigneley. Mignard must have been pleased with the orchestration of the complex composition in this large red chalk study, for he squared the sheet for transfer, although certain details would ultimately be changed. In the painting, a mother and child replace the seated male onlooker pointing towards Christ in the foreground, the figure of Veronica kneeling before Christ is omitted, and the young man leading the procession has disappeared while three running children have been added. Despite the large number of figures, the complex composition is rendered with clarity. The way to Calvary is portrayed with all the vigor characteristic of Mignard's works. The tragic dimension of the scene is conveyed by the attitudes and facial expressions of the figures, progressing from fear and terror to pain. In the background, Golgotha, the site of Christ's crucifixion, dominates the rolling landscape. This ambitious sheet with its beautiful figure groupings recalling Italian prototypes, represents an advanced stage of planning for one of Mignard's greatest works. Museum: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA.

alb3606146 Denis Diderot (1713-1784). Artist: Jean Antoine Houdon (French, Versailles 1741-1828 Paris). Culture: French, Paris. Dimensions: Height (bust): 15 3/4 in. (40 cm); Height (stand): 4 11/16 in. (11.9 cm). Date: 1773.A philosopher and man of letters, and one of the internationally famous exponents of the French Enlightenment, Denis Diderot is best known for the multivolume encyclopedia that he compiled and coedited with Jean Le Rond d'Alembert (1717-1783) between 1751 and 1772. In the entry for painted portraits, Diderot's Encyclopédie states that the principal merit of the genre is to render the sitter exactly, by capturing both his character and his physiognomy.[1] A portrait bust of Diderot, believed to be the terracotta bust now in the Musée du Louvre, which served as a model for the Museum's marble version, was exhibited by the sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon at the Salon of 1771. The sitter approved of that work, describing it as très ressemblant ( having a very strong resemblance). It was also well received by contemporary critics, one of whom wrote: "I single out the bald head of the editor of the Encyclopédie. The flame of genius brought that bust to life; there is a fire, an expression, that gives it a striking resemblance; I don't want to say it out loud, but our colleagues the painters have done nothing equal."[2]Winner of the Prix de Rome in 1761, Houdon had spent ten years in Italy and was profoundly influenced by the arts of antiquity. Diderot is shown as a classical philosopher, bare-chested and without wig or other paraphernalia. Justly known for his naturalistic portraiture and his classic simplicity, Houdon was very successful in capturing his sitter's lively eyes and conveying the determination and intelligence that won Diderot many admirers and some enemies--as attested by the words inscribed on the plinth: "il eut de grands Amis et, quelques bas jaloux / le Soleil plait à l'aigle, et blesse les hiboux" ( He had great friends and a few low jealous ones / the sun pleases the eagle and wounds the owls). The slightly parted lips are said to have suggested the brilliance of Diderot's conversation. This is consistent with Horace Walpole's description of the philosopher in his journal entry for September 19, 1765, as "a very lively old man, and great talker."[3]Possibly shown at the Salon of 1773, the Museum's marble bust, signed and dated by the artist, was acquired by a patron of Houdon's, the Russian Francophile Count Alexander Sergeyevich Stroganoff (1733-1811), during a sojourn in Paris. It remained for many years at the Stroganoff palace in Saint Petersburg. In 1773 Diderot himself traveled to Russia, at the invitation of Empress Catherine the Great (1729-1796), a supporter of his work with whom he had corresponded.[Daniëlle Kisluk-Grosheide, 2010]Footnotes:[1] Diderot 1751-72, vol. 13 (1765), p. 153.[2] Journal encyclopédique (Collection Deloynes 49, no. 1320), quoted by Scherf 2008b, p. 44.[3] Walpole 1937-83, vol. 7 (1939), p. 262. Museum: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA.

alb3667597 The Martyrdom of Saint Cecilia (Cartoon for a Fresco). Artist: Domenichino (Domenico Zampieri) (Italian, Bologna 1581-1641 Naples). Dimensions: Irregular oval: 67 13/16 × 59 9/16 in. (172.2 × 151.3 cm). Date: 1612-14.This monumental, exquisitely rendered composition is among the most significant extant cartoons (full-scale drawings) by Domenichino. It was a preparatory design for the central portion of his fresco of the Martyrdom of Saint Cecilia, painted on the left wall of the Polet chapel at San Luigi dei Francesi, the French church of Rome. Domenichino received the contract for the frescoes on February 16, 1612, from Pierre Polet (died in Rome in 1613), a prelate from the diocese of Noyon who was dedicated to the cult of Saint Cecilia. In 1599, he had attended the exhumation of her relics from a casket underneath the high altar of her titular church at Santa Cecilia in Trastevere in Rome. According to Jacobus de Voragine's Golden Legend, Cecilia (2nd or 3rd century A.D., Rome), a virtuous virgin matron was to be burned in a boiling bath, "but she remained in the bath as in a cool place, nor felt so much as a drop of sweat." She then suffered three decapitating blows of the sword that did not sever her head, and since a fourth blow was prohibited by Roman law, she lived on for three more days, during which she gave all her possessions to the poor. On her last day, Saint Cecilia entrusted to Pope Urban all the Christians that she had converted and beckoned him to consecrate her house as a church. Domenichino's final work alludes to this part of the story, and, here, the moribund Cecilia is seen at center, attended by a maid servant, a bearded man, and a child at right. Domenichino holds a pivotal place in the development of Baroque Classicism in Rome, and his frescoes in the Polet chapel at San Luigi dei Francesi are amongst the principal examples of that style. Since this is the most important Italian Baroque drawing in the United States, the following, more indepth observations may be added. This is the only large cartoon (full-scale drawing) for a major work by an important Renaissance or Baroque artist in this country. Two cartoon fragments by Domenichino, for the left and right sides of the composition of the Martyrdom of Saint Cecilia, are preserved in the Musée du Louvre, Département des arts graphiques inv. nos. 9080 and 9081 (Paris). They too have pricked outlines for the transfer of the design and are drawn in a similar technique and medium on a surface comprised of multiple sheets of paper joined together. The drawing surface of the Metropolitan Museum's cartoon is comprised of fourteen large sheets of paper, which was originally of a blue-gray hue like many other drawings of this time. As is typical of Renaissance and Baroque artistic practice, the sheets of paper of the cartoon were glued together (probably with flour paste), with overlapping seams. This was done in the artist's studio, by the artist himself or by a studio assistant. Domenichino's cartoon is drawn very carefully in charcoal with white chalk hightlighting, but the handling is very broad in many passages and many pentimenti are evident. The strokes of charcoal in important passages of the design are rubbed together to create effects of sfumato, but many other passages of parallel hatching and outlines were left untouched by the artist. The technique of drawing cartoons is often very bold, because such drawings are meant to be seen from a far viewing distance. The outlines of the cartoon were pricked for the transfer of the design, but in this case this was probably to transfer the design to a "substitute cartoon," which was the object actually used on the moist fresco surface itself. This technique of the "substitute cartoon" saved the valuable carefully executed drawing from destruction in the working process. Once Domenichino's beautifully drawn cartoon served its purpose in the artist's studio, it was preserved as a collector's item: it was cut in the shape of an oval, lined with canvas, and was mounted on a stretcher like a picture for display before 1705 or 1706. The cartoon's frame dates to the eighteenth century. Domenichino has focused attention on the drama of Saint Cecilia's suffering, her faith and her spirituality at the moment of death. Her idealized beauty, expression, and corporeal grace of pose are meant to convey the transcendental beauty of her Christian virtue. The viewer's reaction to this scene of the saint's noble suffering and unwavering faith was critically important to the artist's thinking in developing the composition. The figures at right participate as witnesses to the scene. The gestures of these secondary figures at right play out the reactions of empathy and contemplation the artist expected from the viewers seeing the composition: the devout practioners attending church.There are slightly differing accounts on the martyrdom of Saint Cecilia, who was already accepted into the hagiographic canon by the fifth century A.D. The main source on her life, Jacobus de Voragine's Golden Legend (thirteenth century), states that she was to be burned in a boiling bath, "but she remained in the bath as in a cool place, nor felt so much as a drop of sweat." The virtuous virgin matron then suffered three decapitating blows of the sword that did not sever her head, and since a fourth blow was prohibited by law, she lived on for three more days, during which she gave all her possessions to the poor (the mainscene fresoed on the opposite wall of the Polet chapel). On her last day, Saint Cecilia entrusted to Pope Urban all the Christians that she had converted and beckoned him to consecrate her house as a church. Domenichino's composition of the saint's martyrdom includes the pope and the converts in an atemporal arrangement that also alludes to the consecration of her house. Domenichino's biographers, Giovanni Pietro Bellori (1672) and Giambattista Passeri (1772) also describe the particulars of Saint Cecilia's martyrdom.Domenichino represented the agonizing Saint Cecilia within the imposing interior of a Roman bath (presumably the caldarium that was part of her house),where the prefect Almachius had unsuccessfully attempted to have her martyred. The contract between patron and artist governing the commission of this fresco, dated February 16,1612, mentions this setting.In 1599, the patron commissioning the fresco, Pierre Polet had apparently attended the exhumation of the saint's relics from a casket underneath the high altar of the basilica of Santa Cecilia in Trastevere, and this event was recorded. The ceremony of recognition of the relics was officiated by the titular of the basilica, Cardinal Paolo Sfondrati, on October, 19, 1599, and was witnessed by the great debunker of saints of the Counter-Reformation movement, Cesare Baronio, who pronounced the relics authentic.The cartoons by Domenichino for the two main frescoed scenes in the Polet chapel at San Luigi dei Francesi are also cited in the 1612 contract between the patron and the artist. According to the document, the cartoons were to be retained by the priest Don Mass. Bruni, the prior of the church of San Luigi dei Francesi. The cartoons for the sides of the fresco of the Martyrdom of Saint Cecilia (the fragments today in the Louvre) passed to the collection of the painter Charles Le Brun, then to the French royal collections and the Louvre.The cartoons by Domenichino were from the beginning regarded as the key drawings for the Polet Chapel, and the central portion of the composition with the Martyrdom of Saint Cecilia (i.e., the work today at the Met) was probably especially prized. This may well explain why this is the only major surviving cartoon for the project which Charles Le Brun was unable to acquire when he visited Rome after Domenichino's death. It is clear from a reading of the contract of February 16, 1612, between Domenichino and his patron, that the first owner of the proposed cartoon section for the Martyrdom of Saint Cecilia must have been the priest - possibly the prior of San Luigi dei Francesi -- Don Mass. Bruni, who must have also owned the Louvre cartoon fragments for the composition, the ones which Charles Le Brun obtained during his Roman sojourn in 1642-48. The 1664 inventory of the possessions of Francesco Raspantino, Domenichino's pupil in Naples and artistic heir, lists three preparatory cartoon fragments for the Polet chapel decoration by his master: the "Marriage of Saint Cecilia to Valerian," the "Apotheosis of Saint Cecilia," and "Saint Cecilia Refusing to Sacrifice to the Idols." Curiously, none of these are for parts of the fresco decoration that were deemed significant in the 1612 contract. Finally, Charles Le Brun was apparently unable to procure the central and main portion of the composition of the "Martyrdom of Saint Cecilia," for he had it copied in full scale in a large drawing that is in the Musée du Louvre. It may (or may not) be the cartoon referred to in a Chigi inventory of 1705/6. (Carmen C. Bambach, September 2015). Museum: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA.

alb3675298 Francesco I de' Medici (1541-1587), Grand Duke of Tuscany. Artist: After a model by Giambologna (Netherlandish, Douai 1529-1608 Florence). Culture: Italian, Florence. Dimensions: Overall (confirmed): H. 30 3/8 x W. 24 1/2 x D. 13 11/16 in. (77.2 x 62.2 x 34.7 cm). Founder: Probably cast by Pietro Tacca (Italian, Carrara 1577-1640 Florence). Date: modeled 1585-87, cast ca. 1611.This imposing portrait of Grand Duke Francesco I de' Medici dates between 1585, when he received the Order of the Golden Fleece (the badge dangles prominently from a chain around his neck) and 1587, when he died. The model for the bronze clearly owes its character to the premier sculptor of the Medici family, Giambologna. Yet its facture is consistent with sculptures that Giambologna produced later in his career, specifically the work characteristic of his principal studio assistant, Pietro Tacca. Documents bear out the supposition that this sculpture is a later interpretation by Tacca of the older master's concept. Giambologna's most famous Medici portrait -- an equestrian monument to Francesco's father, Cosimo I, initiated in 1577 and installed in the Piazza della Signoria, Florence, in 1587 -- became the iconic image of the Florentine rulers and set standards across Europe.[1] When Queen Marie de Médicis (née Maria de' Medici) decided to commission an equestrian monument to her husband, King Henry IV of France, she relied on her family back in Italy to press the busy Giambologna to execute that monument.[2] Following the sculptor's death in 1608, the commission passed to Pietro Tacca. The bronze horse and rider were shipped from Florence to Paris in 1611, together with a bust. On October 7, 1614, Matteo Bartolini, the Tuscan emissary in Paris, wrote to his masters that the queen was sending 300 scudi to Tacca in recompense for the bust in bronze of her father, Francesco I. [3] When the Museum's bust appeared on the market in 1983, it was recognized as the long-lost possession of Marie de Médicis.Its debt to models by Giambologna and its execution by Tacca are evident. What may be Giambologna's earliest bronze bust of Cosimo I (Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence) is the direct prototype for Francesco I.[4] The image of the son follows that of the father: identical Renaissance armor -- with scalloped pauldrons and a rope motif centered across the breastplate -- is in both cases crossed by a sword sash over the right shoulder, topped by the ceremonial chain. The date of the bust of Cosimo is uncertain. It was probably cast after 1553, when the artist moved to Florence. Another scholar suggests, however, that it was made at the time of Cosimo's death, in 1574, and if so, the sculptor may have deliberately paired the busts of Cosimo and Francesco.[5] The parentage of the New York bust is clear, and there are also echoes in it of other Giambologna busts of Francesco, notably an example in marble over the door of the former Teatro Mediceo in Florence.[6] Similarly clad in contemporary armor, though wearing a sash over the left shoulder, that one lacks the badge of the Golden Fleece and thus predates the Museum's bronze; however, the fairly fleshy face and full beard indicate that the two are not far apart in date. Both busts accord with painted portraits, such as that by an anonymous artist in the circle of Scipione Pulzone in the Palazzo Pitti, Florence. [7] Earlier canvases, such as Tommaso d'Antonio Manzuoli's portrait of 1560 (Museo Civico, Prato), and marbles, such as Giovanni Bandini's Francesco I (Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence), with thinner face and beard, show how the duke's physiognomy changed over time; the full sequence of images indicates that the Museum's bronze bust represents the duke toward the end of his life.[8]Crisp chasing of the surface, sharp folds in the drapery, and a translucent reddish lacquer patina are characteristic of bronzes from Giambologna and his workshop later in the sculptor's career.[9] It seems likely that Tacca, a considerable artist in his own right, interpreted Giambologna's model and produced a meticulously clean bronze for his exalted and demanding patron, the queen of France.[10] The idealized, somewhat abstract portrait of Francesco accords with the imperious image the Medici sought for themselves. Created posthumously, the bronze captures the likeness but preserves the dignity of the sitter as an iconic image of a ruler. This was a man more at home in his studiolo, poring over natural specimens or fostering such inventions as Medici porcelain, than with ruling the state from the great hall (today the Salone dei Cinquecento) of the Palazzo Vecchio. Francesco's somewhat vacant stare manages to appear commanding while divulging no secrets of the inner man's true personality.[Ian Wardropper. European Sculpture, 1400-1900, In the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2011, no. 30, pp. 96-97.]Footnotes:[1] John Pope-Hennessy. An Introduction to Italian Sculpture. 3 vols. Vol. 3, Italian High Renaissance and Baroque Sculpture. 4th ed. London, 1996, pp. 335 - 36, 492 - 93, pl. 316. [2] See Geneviève Bresc-Bautier in Cast in Bronze: French Sculpture from the Renaissance to Revolution. Exh cat. edited by Geneviève Bresc-Bautier and Guilhem Scherf, with James David Draper, and with contributions by Jane Bassett et al. Musée du Louvre, Paris; The Metropolitan Museum of Art; J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles; 2008-9. Paris, 2009. [French ed., Bronzes français 2008.], pp. 164 - 69, nos. 40, 41, for a recent account of the commission.[3] Archivio di Stato, Florence, Carteggio Mediceo, no. 4629 (first published in Giovanni [Johann Wilhelm] Gaye. Carteggio inedito d'artisti dei secoli XIV, XV, XVI. 3 vols. Florence, 1839-40. [Reprint ed., Turin, 1968.], vol. 3,p. 539).[4] Karla Langedijk. The Portraits of the Medici, Fifteenth-Eighteenth Centuries. 3 vols. Florence, 1981-87, vol. 1 pp. 469 - 70, no. 27,122. [5] Charles Avery. Giambologna: The Complete Sculpture. Oxford, 1987, pp. 167, 256, no. 32, pl. 172.[6] Ibid., pp. 169, 254, no. 15, pl. 175.[7] Les Trésors des Médicis, la Florence des Médicis: Une Ville et une cour d'Europe. Exh. cat. edited by Cristina Acidini Luchinat and Mario Scalini. Kunsthalle der Hypo-Kulturstiftung, Munich; Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna; Château de Blois; 1998-99. Paris, Munich, and Florence, 1999, p. 95, no. 35.[8] Elena Carrara in Masters of Florence: Glory and Genius of the Court of the Medici. Exh. cat. Pyramid, Memphis; 2004. Memphis, 2004, p. 148; Francesco Vossilla in Magnificenza alla corte dei Medici: Arte a Firenze alla fine del Cinquecento. Exh. cat. Museo degli Argenti, Palazzo Pitti, Florence; 1997-98. Milan, 1997, p. 31. no. 4.[9] Richard E. Stone (Richard E. Stone. "Organic Patinas on Small Bronzes of the Italian Renaissance." Metropolitan Museum Journal 45 (2010), pp. 107-23, p. 109) has analyzed its "magnificent organic patina of a striking color like that of a very old burgundy wine" (but he was unable to identify the resin that gives it its distinctive hue).[10] Jessica Mack-Andrick. Pietro Tacca, Hofbildhauer der Medici (1577-1640): Politische Funktion und Ikonographie des frühabsolutistischen Herrscherdenkmals unter den Grossherzögen Ferdinando I., Cosimo II. und Ferdinando II. Weimar, 2005; Pietro Tacca: Carrara, la Toscana, le grandi corti europee. Exh. cat. edited by Franca Falleti. Centro Internazionale delle Arti Plastiche, Carrara; 2007. Florence, 2007. Museum: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA.

alb3680404 Spartan Soldier. Artist: Charles Nègre (French, 1820-1880). Dimensions: Image: 35.3 x 43.5 cm (13 7/8 x 17 1/8 in.). Date: 1859.Astonished on first seeing daguerreotypes (about 1844) and dreaming of the medium's potential, Charles Nègre immediately resolved to devote himself to the new art, experimenting first with daguerreotypy and, after 1847, with paper photography. Like Le Secq and Le Gray, Nègre had studied painting with Paul Delaroche, and his experience at the easel was the foundation for his photographic work of the early 1850s--genre scenes of Parisian street musicians, chimney sweeps, and vendors, as well as architectural views.Despite his acknowledged talent Nègre failed time and again either to win government support for or to bring to fruition the grand projects he envisioned for the new medium. Bypassed by the Commission des Monuments Historiques in the assignment of "missions héliographiques," Nègre produced some two hundred negatives for a self-initiated project entitled "Midi de la France," only to abandon the publication after issuing two fascicles. Frus trated in his effort to reap any financial benefit from his remarkable photogravure process, he proposed in 1858 that the city of Paris underwrite a 200- to 250-plate photogravure series on the appearance and history of the capital and that the Ministry of State commission a still larger project portraying "the history of humanity" through the collections of the Louvre. Neither proposal was accepted.Finally gaining official sponsorship in 1859 for a series of fifty photogravures depicting statuary in the Tuileries Gardens, Nègre produced a group of large-format glass negatives. Characteristically, the project was stymied before completion, but a few unique prints of Nègre's heroic images survive, printed in reverse for translation into photogravure. Here, outlined against the theatrical backdrop of garden greenery and the central pavilion of the Tuileries Palace, Jean-Pierre Cortot's "Spartan Soldier" (1831) seems to rise toward the light. The fate of this soldier, who collapsed and died of exhaustion immediately after he had run to Athens to announce the rout of the Persian invaders at Marathon, seems an apt metaphor for Nègre's own foundering under the weight of his immense ability and ambition even as he heralded the triumphant potential of the medium. Nègre's unfulfilled project is among the last attempts at true artistry before the pressures of commercialism turned photography into a full-scale industry in the early 1860s. Museum: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA.