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Lot Essay
La Hyre’s painting illustrates a passage from the epic poem of 1532 by Ludovico Ariosto (1474-1533), Orlando Furioso (canto XIX:28), in which the lovers Angelica and Medoro are depicted carving their names into the bark of a tree. Set against the background of war between Charlemagne’s Christian Paladins and the invading Saracen army that was attempting to overthrow the Christian Empire, Orlando Furioso is an often fantastical epic of love and war. The story tells of the chivalric romance of the Christian knight Orlando, his unrequited love for the Pagan princess Angelica, and her infatuation with the wounded Saracen knight, Medoro, whom she saves and eventually elopes with to Cathay. The expression of the unbreakable union of Angelica and Medoro culminates in the intertwining of their names on the trunk of a tree: “Amid these joyes (as great as joyes might be)/ Their manner was on evry wall within,/ Without on evry stone or shady tree,/ To grave their names with bodkin, knife or pin,/ Angelica and Medore, you plaine might see,/ (So great the glory had they both therein)/ Angelica and Medore in evry place,/ With sundry knots and wreathes they interlace.” (J. Harrington translation).
The six gamboling putti that surround the couple as they inscribe their names on the tree make no appearance in Ariosto’s poem, and are entirely the painter’s invention. The birth of the first of his five children in 1640 – a son, Philippe, with Marguerite Coquin, whom he had married the previous year – may have provided La Hyre with inspiration, and even a model, for the playful cupids.
An earlier variant of the composition, with five putti rather than six, is lost but appeared in the sale of the Prince de Conti in 1777; a copy of it is in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Marseilles (see P. Rosenberg & J. Thuillier, Laurent de la Hyre (1606-1656): L'homme et l'oeuvre, exhibition catalogue, Geneva, 1988, no. 189). Besides the absence of the putto who hangs from the branch above the heads of the lovers in the present picture, there are numerous other small differences between the two works. Most significantly, the lost picture was considerably narrower in format (by almost a foot) and lacks the extensive landscape that dominates the right side of the 1641 canvas. La Hyre was a master landscapist – inspired no doubt by his love of the Ile-de-France and enthusiasm for hunting - and the pellucid light and brilliant blue sky, carefully observed foliage, and shimmering hills of the present painting draw comparison to the works of Pierre Patel, one of the most talented landscape painters among La Hyre’s Paris contemporaries. The greater development and sophistication of the landscape here is one of the reasons Rosenberg and Thuillier assign the lost Conti version of the composition to an earlier date of c. 1638-1640.
It is not known if the present Angelica and Medoro was commissioned or for whom it was painted. It is first recorded in an anonymous sale organised by Paillet on 9 April 1793, lot 76 (sold 600 livres), where its six putti are cited and it was praised for the handling of the landscape and beauty of its palette.
The six gamboling putti that surround the couple as they inscribe their names on the tree make no appearance in Ariosto’s poem, and are entirely the painter’s invention. The birth of the first of his five children in 1640 – a son, Philippe, with Marguerite Coquin, whom he had married the previous year – may have provided La Hyre with inspiration, and even a model, for the playful cupids.
An earlier variant of the composition, with five putti rather than six, is lost but appeared in the sale of the Prince de Conti in 1777; a copy of it is in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Marseilles (see P. Rosenberg & J. Thuillier, Laurent de la Hyre (1606-1656): L'homme et l'oeuvre, exhibition catalogue, Geneva, 1988, no. 189). Besides the absence of the putto who hangs from the branch above the heads of the lovers in the present picture, there are numerous other small differences between the two works. Most significantly, the lost picture was considerably narrower in format (by almost a foot) and lacks the extensive landscape that dominates the right side of the 1641 canvas. La Hyre was a master landscapist – inspired no doubt by his love of the Ile-de-France and enthusiasm for hunting - and the pellucid light and brilliant blue sky, carefully observed foliage, and shimmering hills of the present painting draw comparison to the works of Pierre Patel, one of the most talented landscape painters among La Hyre’s Paris contemporaries. The greater development and sophistication of the landscape here is one of the reasons Rosenberg and Thuillier assign the lost Conti version of the composition to an earlier date of c. 1638-1640.
It is not known if the present Angelica and Medoro was commissioned or for whom it was painted. It is first recorded in an anonymous sale organised by Paillet on 9 April 1793, lot 76 (sold 600 livres), where its six putti are cited and it was praised for the handling of the landscape and beauty of its palette.