Laurent de la Hyre

Paul Henreid, Vienna, then Los Angeles;
By whose estate sold ("Property from the Estate of Paul Henreid"), New York, Sotheby's, May 20, 1993, lot 7, for $415,000;
Anonymous sale ("Property of a Private Collector"), New York, Sotheby's, January 24, 2002, lot 26.

The following condition report has been provided by Simon Parkes of Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc. 502 East 74th St. New York, NY 212-734-3920, simonparkes@msn.com , an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. This painting is in beautiful condition. The canvas has an old glue lining and the paint layer is stable and well stretched. The painting has been cleaned, well varnished and should be hung as is in its current frame. There are hardly any retouches visible to this extremely well-preserved picture. There are a couple of dots of retouch visible under ultraviolet light in the upper right sky and in the upper center sky. However, it appears that throughout the rest of the picture there are no restorations of any significance and the condition of this paintings should be commended.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Laurent de la Hyre grew up in a family of painters. He studied at the château of Fontainebleau between 1622 and 1625, copying works by Francesco Primaticcio among other artists, and then in the celebrated studio of Georges Lallemant, where Nicolas Poussin and Michel Dorigny also studied. He received his first important commissions from the Paris house of the Capuchins in the Marais for their chapel of St. Francis. These works were well received and brought him further employment, and this may explain why he was not tempted to go to Italy to complete his artistic education, but preferred to remain in Paris. From 1635 to 1637, La Hyre executed paintings for the "Mays" of Notre Dame de Paris (pictures presented annually by the Paris Goldsmiths' Corporation). By the end of the 1630s, La Hyre was well known as a painter and greatly in favour with various religious orders, having Cardinal de Richelieu as his fervent protector. When the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture was founded in 1648, La Hyre was appointed one of the twelve "Anciens", or professors, taking an active part in the current debate about perspective. During the late 1640s and the 1650s, La Hyre had many private patrons including financiers, members of the Paris Parlement and royal officials, producing some of his most important masterpieces.

La Hyre's painted landscapes all appear to have been executed in the last decade of his career. Their intimate scales (rarely are they over a meter in width) suggest that there was a demand for them from private collectors which continued throughout what remained of his life. From 1647 onwards, he painted a succession of exquisite landscapes among which are the (unusually) large Laban Searching for his Idols (dated 1647, Musée du Louvre, Paris), Landscape with Swineherd (dated 1648, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Montreal), Landscape with Shepherds Watering their Flock (dated 1656, Sale: New York, Sotheby's, January 22, 2004, lot 36) and Landscape with Bathers (dated 1653, same year as present painting, Musée du Louvre, Paris).  As in the present composition, classical ruins are usually grouped to one side, a solitary tree defines the foreground on the other, and a path or running water leads the eye into the distance which opens up onto a wooded vista.

Charles Sterling, the eminent French art historian, wrote of La Hyre:  "He was a subtle painter, with a light brush stroke, a sense of delicate atmospheric values, and skill in combining bright, unusual colors. La Hyre heralds the French eighteenth century, foreshadowing both Boucher's grace and the affected Neoclassical sobriety of the pupils of David^."1

Note on the Provenance
Paul Henreid (1908 - 1992)
Paul Henreid's sophisticated charm and continental elegance were forever immortalized in celluloid with the release of two films made in 1942 by Hal Wallis for Warner Brothers. Playing Victor Lazlo opposite Ingrid Bergman in Michael Curtiz's Casablanca and Bette Davis' lover, Jerry, in Irving Rappner's Now Voyager, Henreid's imperturable urbanity and impecable demeanor with the opposite sex became the envy of all women and the emulation of young men for more than a generation. His effortless lighting and exchange of cigarettes in Now Voyager is one of the supreme, sexually charged moments in all of film history.

Henreid, Viennese by birth, had been recruited by Otto Preminger when just out of actor's school for Max Reinhardt's repertory Vienna Theatre. He soon appeared regularly in both plays and films in Austria, later in England after he moved there in 1935, and, of course, in Hollywood where he emigrated in 1940 and remained for the rest of his life. In addition to acting, he produced and directed television, film and theatre right into the 1970's. Although less well known, Henreid, as the grandson of a professional artist, also attended the Akademie der bildenden Künste in Vienna. And, his marriage to Elizabeth the daughter of Gustav Glück, Director of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna from 1911 - 1931, provided further impetus to his interests in art and collecting. Henreid and his wife brought their collection when they moved to America and lived surrounded by it until his death in 1992 and his wife's the following year.

1  See Laurent de La Hyre, 1606 - 1656: L'homme et l'oeuvre, exhibition catalogue by P. Rosenberg and J. Thuillier, Geneva 1988, p. 110.