Hubert Robert (1733-1808)
Hubert Robert (1733-1808)

A courtyard at the Villa Pamphilj, Rome

Details
Hubert Robert (1733-1808)
A courtyard at the Villa Pamphilj, Rome
signed and dated 'H. ROBERT À ROMA 1762'
black chalk, pen and brown ink, watercolor, watermark D&C BLAUW
12½ x 17.5/8 in. (319 x 447 mm.)
Provenance
P.-J. Mariette (L. 1852, twice); Paris, 26 November 1775 - 30 January 1776, part of lot 1345.
A. D. Bérard (L. 75).
Henri Lacroix.
Louis Cartier; Sotheby's Monaco, 26 November 1979, lot 514.
Literature
C. Gabillot, Hubert Robert et son temps, Paris, 1895, p. 129, illustrated.
J. Cailleux, 'Hubert Robert's Submissions to the Salon of 1769', The Burlington Magazine, 1975, supplement October 1975, note 67.
V. Carlson, Hubert Robert, Drawings & Watercolors, exhib. cat., Washington, National Gallery of Art, 1978, under no. 39.
Exhibited
Paris, Salon, 1769, under no. 98.

Lot Essay

Another version of this drawing, in reverse, is in the Cleveland Museum of Art, V. Carlson, op. cit., no. 39. The Cleveland watercolor, dated 1774, was executed by Robert over a black chalk counterproof of the present drawing.
The sequence of the two drawings shows how, for many years after his return from Italy, Hubert Robert still took his inspiration directly from his Roman experience: he kept the present drawing for seven years before exhibiting it at the Salon and retained the Cleveland counterproof for twelve years before coloring it. The present drawing is one of the three sketched by Gabriel de Saint-Aubin in the margin of number 98 in his copy of the 1769 Salon exhibition booklet, J. Cailleux, op. cit., fig. 1.
The identification of the site with the Villa Pamphilj is traditional.

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