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Lot Essay
As first painter to the King, between 1715 and 1717 Antoine Coypel carried out a series of seven paintings with scenes from the story of Aeneas for the Grande galerie at the Palais Royal in Paris, complementing the same artist's Assembly of the Gods of 1703. Paintings from the series are now kept at the Musée Fabre in Montpellier, the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Arras and the Louvre. The present drawing is a preparatory sketch for the figure of Orpheus in The Descent of Aeneas into Hell at the Louvre (inv. 3546; see N. Garnier, Antoine Coypel (1661-1722), Paris, 1989, no. 130, fig. 426).
Two compositional studies for the painting survive, at the Louvre (inv. RF 12349) and the Städel Museum, Frankfurt (inv. 1088; see ibid., nos. 511, 512, figs. 427 and 428), the former in red chalk and in reverse of the final painting, the latter aux trois crayons. Orpheus is depicted sitting at right in the composition, playing a viola da braccia rather than the lyre seen in this study. Coypel went on to make
individual figure studies, twelve of which were identified by Nathalie Strasser, the majority, like the present sheet, drawn aux trois crayons and squared (Strasser, op. cit., 2016, p. 78, n. 7).
Seen in the context of the quarrel in French art of the first half of the century between anciens and modernes, this study is a perfect example of the virtuosity with which Coypel handles colour not only in painting, but in also in drawing, thanks to the use of the three different chalks to depict the play of light on the torso of Orpheus.
Two compositional studies for the painting survive, at the Louvre (inv. RF 12349) and the Städel Museum, Frankfurt (inv. 1088; see ibid., nos. 511, 512, figs. 427 and 428), the former in red chalk and in reverse of the final painting, the latter aux trois crayons. Orpheus is depicted sitting at right in the composition, playing a viola da braccia rather than the lyre seen in this study. Coypel went on to make
individual figure studies, twelve of which were identified by Nathalie Strasser, the majority, like the present sheet, drawn aux trois crayons and squared (Strasser, op. cit., 2016, p. 78, n. 7).
Seen in the context of the quarrel in French art of the first half of the century between anciens and modernes, this study is a perfect example of the virtuosity with which Coypel handles colour not only in painting, but in also in drawing, thanks to the use of the three different chalks to depict the play of light on the torso of Orpheus.