Nicolas Régnier Maubeuge, Flanders circa 1590 - 1667 Venice

So closely is he associated with the brilliant group of French Caravaggistes active in Rome in the early decades of the 17^th Century, Nicolas Régnier’s Flemish origins and early training in Antwerp are often forgotten.¹  He was a pupil of Abraham Janssen whose own work had already done much to disseminate the early influence of the Italian Baroque in the North, and whose pupils included some of the most important Flemish tenebrist painters.  His biographer and friend, Joachim von Sandrart noted that upon his arrival in Rome, circa 1615, he frequented the studio of Bartolomeo Manfredi, who was to be a continued influence on his style.

This Saint Matthew and the Angel dates from the early 1620’s, Régnier’s moment of greatest artistic potency.  The figure of the elderly evangelist is depicted slumped over his writing desk as if just roused from sleep by the adolescent angel who rests his hand on the saint’s shoulder.  In its strong and evocative narrative conception, it recalls the first Saint Matthew and the Angel which Caravaggio had painted for the Contarelli chapel in San Luigi dei  Francesi in Rome.  That painting was famously rejected because of its uncomfortable imagery and the perceived indecorous pose of the Saint, and as a result was purchased by Vincenzo Giustiniani, one of the greatest collectors of the day.  It is a picture which Régnier would have known very well; Giustiniani was one of Régnier’s most important patrons, and the artist lodged in Palazzo Giustiniani for part of his time in Rome.   It certainly would have served Régnier as an inspiration for his own depictions of the theme; in fact, among the nine canvases by the artist listed in the Giustiniani inventory of 1638, there is one depicting “S. Matteo [di mano di Nicolò Ranieri]…. in tela alta palmi 11 ½ Larga 9 ½ incirca senza cornici .^2”   

While the Giustiniani Saint Matthew has not been yet identified (and cannot be associated with the present canvas), it documents Régnier’s interest in the theme in the years before his departure from Rome in 1625.  Other treatments of this subject dating from these years are extant, and perhaps the most compelling comparison with the present work may be made with the example in the collection of the Ringling Art Museum, Sarasota, Florida.  That canvas is datable to 1620-25, and although of a different composition, it has many of the same elements: Saint Matthew, fully intent on his gospel, is shown at a draped table, and the young angel also runs his index finger across the text while resting his hand on the evangelist’s shoulder.  The physiognomies of the figures are very similar as well, and it seems likely that the two canvases would have been painted within a few years of each other. 

After inspecting the present work first hand, Annick Lemoine will include the present picture in her forthcoming catalogue raisonné on the works of Nicolas Régnier (to be published by Arthena in 2007); she has noted some weaknesses in secondary passages due to old restoration.

1 Régnier was born in the town of Maubeuge, then in the French speaking Flemish province of Hainaut, which was later ceded to France in the Treaty of Nijmegen in 1678.

2  [Trans: "St. Matthew (by the hand of Nicolo Raineri) on canvas about 11 1.2 palmi high by 9 ½ across, unframed"]. The painting was hung in the same room with three other canvases representing the other evangelists by Domenichino, Reni and Albani.  It might be supposed that the canvases formed a “made up set,” even though the Reni was of a slightly smaller size, and the other three were of matching measurements.  Of all of the canvases, only the Domenichino of Saint John the Evangelist is identifiable (see R. Spear, Domenichino, New Haven and London 1982, p.p. 270-27).  Please also see S. Danesi Squarzina, La collezione Giustiniani, Turin 2003, vol. I,  p. 343-344.