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Lot Essay
Jean-Baptiste van Mour was born in Valenciennes in 1671 when the city was still under the rule of the Spanish Netherlands. Seven years later it fell to Louis XIV's armies and became French. Accordingly van Mour accompanied the French Ambassador, the Marquis Charles de Ferriol to Istanbul in 1699. Ambassadors would often employ a painter to travel with them, particularly ambassadorial missions outside mainland Europe where there would have been no guarantee of finding artists trained in Western disciplines who could accurately depict material of documentary nature. Moreover the recently formed political and economic alliances between Europe and the Ottomans had made an impact in the culture of both worlds. A new vogue, for things Turkish, ranging from ladies' fashion, to music, literature and the arts spread across Europe in the early eighteenth-century.
Van Mour remained in Istanbul until his death thirty-eight years later. He gained privileged access to the court of Ahmad III (1703-1730) which had a relatively open attitude towards the West. Sultan Ahmad had such a passion for unusual tulips and the extravagant festivities that he and his Grand Vizir held to celebrate them that his reign became known as Lale Devri - 'the Tulip Era'.
In his accounts of his 1727 audience with Ahmad III at the Topkapi Saray Palace, the Dutch ambassador Cornelis Calkoen refers to 'a painter whom his Excellency expressly had presented in order that he might draw and paint the audience'. Indeed two years before van Mour had been appointed Peintre Ordinaire du Roi en Levant. The artist, who avidly sketched views of the bustling city and its inhabitants and faithfully documented court ceremonials, was in the unique position as a westerner of being familiar with the court dignitaries and the strict regulations that prevailed in their dress code. By rendering all this in a faithful manner van Mour ensured himself virtual monopoly of the European market. His most celebrated descriptive series of costume paintings can be found today in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.
The present series of thirty-six paintings by Van Mour and his studio, divided into four groups of nine each, is the most extensive group to come on the market in the last decade. It broadly covers the spectrum of both male and female social types and court dignitaries across the empire during one of the most exciting eras of Ottoman history, culture and civilization. They are depicted either against a neutral background or in a location relevant to their occupation, (for example the Palace cook is in a kitchen). Rather than portraits in the conventional sense, they constitute accurate representations of different types. Van Mour painted all strata of society, court dignitaries, whirling dervishes, Greeks, Jews, Macedonians, Palace guards, praying Moslems, interpreters - in short this series constitutes a type of anthropological study. This approach is the beginning of an attempt reflected in the arts of eighteenth-century Europe to render accurate representations of the Turks rather than the exotic and sometimes exaggerated images of previous centuries.
It is likely that de Ferriol commissioned this type of study circa 1706-7 with the specific intention of issuing a suite of engravings. Upon the Ambassador's return to France he produced the Recueil de cent estampes qui présentent les différentes nations du Levant. Van Mour was not identified as the artist until the 1714 edition but it was this publication that made his name in Europe. It was subsequently translated and reprinted in many languages and became a pattern book for Turkish costumes in eighteenth and nineteenth century books and porcelain. The paintings themselves became a source of inspiration for Turkish and foreign artists and van Mour, himself one of the most important members of the group called les peintres du Bosphore, had such a following in Istanbul that it was called the van Mour School.
The sheer knowledge van Mour had of his subject matter combined with a deep love for the culture he was depicting and a fascination with the rich variety of clothes he was exposed to created the ideal conditions for producing these highly original and informative paintings.
Van Mour remained in Istanbul until his death thirty-eight years later. He gained privileged access to the court of Ahmad III (1703-1730) which had a relatively open attitude towards the West. Sultan Ahmad had such a passion for unusual tulips and the extravagant festivities that he and his Grand Vizir held to celebrate them that his reign became known as Lale Devri - 'the Tulip Era'.
In his accounts of his 1727 audience with Ahmad III at the Topkapi Saray Palace, the Dutch ambassador Cornelis Calkoen refers to 'a painter whom his Excellency expressly had presented in order that he might draw and paint the audience'. Indeed two years before van Mour had been appointed Peintre Ordinaire du Roi en Levant. The artist, who avidly sketched views of the bustling city and its inhabitants and faithfully documented court ceremonials, was in the unique position as a westerner of being familiar with the court dignitaries and the strict regulations that prevailed in their dress code. By rendering all this in a faithful manner van Mour ensured himself virtual monopoly of the European market. His most celebrated descriptive series of costume paintings can be found today in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.
The present series of thirty-six paintings by Van Mour and his studio, divided into four groups of nine each, is the most extensive group to come on the market in the last decade. It broadly covers the spectrum of both male and female social types and court dignitaries across the empire during one of the most exciting eras of Ottoman history, culture and civilization. They are depicted either against a neutral background or in a location relevant to their occupation, (for example the Palace cook is in a kitchen). Rather than portraits in the conventional sense, they constitute accurate representations of different types. Van Mour painted all strata of society, court dignitaries, whirling dervishes, Greeks, Jews, Macedonians, Palace guards, praying Moslems, interpreters - in short this series constitutes a type of anthropological study. This approach is the beginning of an attempt reflected in the arts of eighteenth-century Europe to render accurate representations of the Turks rather than the exotic and sometimes exaggerated images of previous centuries.
It is likely that de Ferriol commissioned this type of study circa 1706-7 with the specific intention of issuing a suite of engravings. Upon the Ambassador's return to France he produced the Recueil de cent estampes qui présentent les différentes nations du Levant. Van Mour was not identified as the artist until the 1714 edition but it was this publication that made his name in Europe. It was subsequently translated and reprinted in many languages and became a pattern book for Turkish costumes in eighteenth and nineteenth century books and porcelain. The paintings themselves became a source of inspiration for Turkish and foreign artists and van Mour, himself one of the most important members of the group called les peintres du Bosphore, had such a following in Istanbul that it was called the van Mour School.
The sheer knowledge van Mour had of his subject matter combined with a deep love for the culture he was depicting and a fascination with the rich variety of clothes he was exposed to created the ideal conditions for producing these highly original and informative paintings.