Architectural capriccio with fountain and caryatids, an allegory of hunting in the foreground

Son of a cabinetmaker, Gilles-Marie Oppenordt studied architecture and worked in the studio of Jules Hardoin-Mansart, before leaving for Rome where he stayed between 1692 and 1699 under the patronage of Edouard Colbert, Marquis of Villacerf (1628-1699) and Surintendant des bâtiments du roi. In Rome, Oppenordt made copies of Roman monuments with great energy, encouraged to do so by the director of the French Academy in Rome, Mathieu de La Teulière (Recueil de plusieurs morceaux d’architecture des differents maistres italiens, 1698, Harvard Houghton Library). Upon his return to France Oppenordt became Directeur général des bâtiments et des jardins du Duc d’Orléans in 1708, in addition to serving as interior decorator for the Palais Royal – the Duke’s primary residence. Despite his official duties as an architect, Oppenordt undertook many private commissions and became a prolific draftsman. Some of his drawings were engraved, primarily by Gabriel Huquier for his book: Nouveau Livre de Fontaines Inventées par le Sieur Oppenordt, published by himself. Huquier was said to possess more than two thousands of Oppenordt’s drawings, many of which were later sold for exorbitant prices (Roland Michel, op. cit.). All of these large architectural caprices present certain common elements, starting with the woman seated in the foreground and her dog (a greyhound), which both feature in a composition of the same technique sold at Christie’s, Paris, 1 April 2008, lot 72. The editor was very enthusiastic about Oppenordt ‘whose easy manner of drawing, and his seductive style, will obtain for him always the pleasure and the admiration of the most able persons’ (P. Fuhring, ‘Two Title Page Designs by Gilles-Marie Oppenordt for His Engraved Œuvre’, in Drawings, September-October 1992, p. 52). The artist made numerous large drawings for the market featuring such architectural capriccios as monumental fountains in a landscape setting, probably as the present ones. His capacity to please and seduce patrons and public alike with these drawings was already noted by his contemporaries (Ibid., p. 49).
The asymmetry of the composition, the use of extravagant sculpture, often caryatids, the combination of stones and vegetation in the background, and finally the presence of almost caricatural figures in the foreground are recurrent motifs in the graphic œuvre of this master of the rocaille. A pair of architectural caprices, also in gray wash, very similar to the two present drawings, was also exhibited at Cailleux in 1991 and dated around 1720 (fig. 1; Roland Michel, op. cit., nos. 9-10).
This rare drawing, and the one in the following lot, are great examples of the artist’s virtuosity as a draftsman. The lively penwork, the control of the medium, the facility of execution, the variety of decorative elements are documents to the artist’s vivid imagination and skill.

Fig. 1. Gilles-Marie Oppenordt, Architectural capriccio. Pen and black ink, gray wash. Private collection.