British Drawings & Watercolours

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Lot 324
  • 324

Johann Heinrich Fuseli, R.A. 1741-1825

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Description

  • Henry Fuseli, R.A.
  • the conversion of st. paul
  • signed l.r.: Dec Fuseli Rome 1778

  • pen and brown ink with grey and brown wash over pencil heightened with white

Provenance

Lester Francis Avnet Collection, New York, catalogue 1968;
Spencer A. Samuels & Company Ltd., New York;
August Laube, Zurich;
Christie's, 6 July 1999, lot 228, (sold for £10,350)

Exhibited

New York, American Federation of Arts, Old Master Drawings, 1970, no. 22

Literature

Gert Schiff, Johann Heinrich Fussli, 1973, Vol I, p. 379, 439 & pl. 1737

Catalogue Note

The present drawing depicts the Conversion of St Paul.  According to the Scriptures, whilst travelling to Damascus with his companions, Paul experienced the risen Christ in a divine vision and fell from his horse, blinded. His nude state in the present work reflects a man stripped of his former worldly powers and his 'rebirth' into Christianity.  His former role as scourge of the martyrs, is symbolised by the fallen spear and upside-down tablet on which he falls.

Fuseli's first study of this subject dates to 1770 and is now in the British Museum. Gert Schiff notes that the central figure of Paul relates to Johan Tobias Sergel's terracotta Faun of 1769, now in the National museum, Stockholm.

We are grateful to Professor David Weinglass for his assistance in cataloguing this lot.