Wednesday, May 10, 2017

Copying Important Paintings in Paris

Anne-Claude de Caylus and Nicolas Le Sueur
after Gianfrancesco Penni
The Egyptians Submerged in the Red Sea
ca. 1710-29
etching and chiaroscuro woodcut
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus and Nicolas Le Sueur
after Giulio Romano
Fishermen hauling in their nets
ca. 1710-29
etching and chiaroscuro woodcut
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude Philippe de Tubières, Comte de Caylus (1692-1765  printmaker, author/poet, collector)

Caylus and his colleagues in Paris in the second and third decades of the eighteenth century worked to make their reproductive prints worthy of major Renaissance and Baroque paintings and drawings, mostly by Italian masters, in the collection of Paris connoisseur-extraordinaire Pierre Crozat (1665-1740). Caylus collaborated with Nicolas Le Sueur to define figures with fine etched outlines and then shade them with woodblocks (printed on a  separate press). Crozat himself is also well-regarded by posterity as patron and friend of young genius-painter Jean-Antoine Watteau (1684-1721). There were productive stretches when Watteau lived and worked in Crozat's house, encouraged (no doubt) in his own struggles with the recalcitrant material world by the daily presence of the paintings these innovative prints were meant to evoke. In the next generation, as we have seen at the Hermitage, the majority of Pierre Crozat's paintings were acquired from his nephew by Catherine the Great and shipped to Russia.

Anne Claude de Caylus and Nicolas Le Sueur
after Andrea Antonio Orazi
Angels carrying the Fleece of Gideon
ca. 1710-29
etching and chiaroscuro woodcut
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus and Nicolas Le Sueur
after Giovanni Maria Morandi
Annunciation
ca. 1710-29
etching and chiaroscuro woodcut
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus and Nicolas Le Sueur
after Cavaliere d'Arpino
Fall of Phaeton
ca. 1710-29
etching and chiaroscuro woodcut
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus and Nicolas Le Sueur
after Baldassare Peruzzi
Androcles and the Lion
ca. 1710-29
etching and chiaroscuro woodcut
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus and Nicolas Le Sueur
after Daniel Seiter
St Sebastian
ca. 1710-29
etching and chiaroscuro woodcut
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus after Rembrandt
Joseph and Potiphar's Wife
c1710-29
etching
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus after Timoteo Viti
Finding of Moses
ca. 1710-29
etching
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus after Raphael
study for Descent of the Saracens
ca. 1710-29
etching
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus after Raphael
study for Descent of the Saracens
ca. 1710-29
etching
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus after Raphael
study for Dispute on the Holy Sacrament
ca. 1710-29
etching
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus after Raphael
Christ carried to the Tomb
ca. 1710-29
etching
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Anne Claude de Caylus after Raphael
Death of Adonis
ca. 1710-29
etching
Teylers Museum, Haarlem