- 96
Hubert Robert Paris 1733 - 1808
Description
- Hubert Robert
- Figures among ruins, including an ancient colonnade, with a row of poplars in the distance
- signed lower right H. ROBERTI, Roma and at center 1761
- oil on canvas
Provenance
Madame Rouille de l'Etang, commissioned from Robert in 1776,
By descent to her daughter, Madame Piscatory,
Thence by descent to her daughter Adelaide-Louise, Marquise de Pastoret, thence by descent to her son,
Amadee-David de Pastoret, and to his wife Louise-Alphonsine, and by descent to their daughter,
Marquise de Plessis-Bellière, Château de Morenil (Somme) (died 1890);
By whose Estate sold, Paris, Drouot, May 10-11, 1897, lot 77 (sold with a companion, lot 76, Les Lavandières);
F.B.Harrison, Esq., Scotland;
McBride, New York;
With Wildenstein & Co., New York;
Ethel Tod Humphrys, New York;
By whose Estate sold, New York, Parke-Bernet Galleries, Inc., November 8-10, 1956, lot 418 (sold with a companion, lot 417, Les Lavandieres);
There purchased by J.R. Streep;
By whom sold, New York, Parke-Bernet Galleries, Inc., April 18, 1962, lot 47A, where purchased by the family of the present owner.
Exhibited
Literature
P. de Nolhac, Hubert Robert, 1738-1808, Paris 1910, p. 152
Catalogue Note
Paintings such as this, with its romanticized pastoral scene, monumental marble columns and warm afternoon light, exemplify Robert's oeuvre produced in Rome between 1754-65. Robert arrived in Rome among the entourage of the French Ambassador to the Holy See, the Comte de Stainville, and he continued to be supported from the highest levels during his sojourn, not least by the Marquis de Marigny, Mme. de Pompadour's brother, and the Duc de Choiseul, made French Foreign Minister in 1758, who was his protector. During his eleven years in Rome, Robert produced countless architectural sketches in the Roman campagna and it was probably with reference to one such drawing that he conceived the Roman temple and antique ruins that form the backdrop to the scene. Although Robert did paint true representations of certain ruins, like the Temple of Vesta at Tivoli, many of the ruins he depicts are inventions, only partly based on reality. The scene here is highly romanticized and would have appealed greatly to Robert's enormous following of wealthy clients both at home, in Paris, and abroad, notably in Russia.
This picture dated 1761 is one of thirteen landscapes which Madame Rouille de l'Etang, commissioned Robert to paint in 1776 for the decoration of her Salon on Place Louis XV in Paris1.
At the time of the 1956 sale of property from the Estate of Ethel Tod Humphrys, this painting was sold with a companion painting also formerly from the collection of the Madame Rouille de l'Etang that was later purchased by the Kimbell Museum of Art and then sold in these rooms in 19872.
1See Provenance
2 New York, Sotheby's, June 4, 1987, lot 166 .