Lot 578
  • 578

Jean-Baptiste de Champaigne

Estimate
15,000 - 20,000 USD
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Description

  • Jean-Baptiste de Champaigne
  • self-portrait at the age of seventeen, head and shoulders turned to the left
  • Black and red chalk with traces of white chalk, on light brown paper;
    bears inscription in pen and brown ink: Jean Baptiste de Champagne/1648

Provenance

Possibly Étienne-François (1672-1731) and Claude-Joseph Geoffroy (1695-1752);
possibly their sale, Paris, 5-16 February 1754, part of lot 66;
Gilbert Paignon-Dijonval;
by descent to Viscount Charles-Gilbert Morel de Vindé;
bought in 1819 with the entire collection by Samuel Woodburn (1786-1853);
sale, Rouen, 24 April 2005, lot 138 (as Nicolas de Plattemontagne), where acquired by the present owner

Exhibited

Évreux, Musée d'Évreux, À l'école de Philippe de Champaigne, 2007, no. 34, as Nicolas de Plattemontagne;
Ìle-de-France, Musée national de Port-Royal des Champs, Trois maîtres du dessin, 2009, p. 85, no. 62, reproduced p. 84

Literature

Bénard, Le cabinet de M. Paignon Dijonval, Paris 1810, no. 1512;

Catalogue Note

This handsome and intimate self-portrait by Jean-Baptiste de Champaigne, nephew and pupil of the better-known Philippe de Champaigne, was until recently believed to be the work of Nicolas de Plattemontagne, his friend and fellow apprentice in the studio of Philippe.  Although catalogued as such by Frédérique Lanoë in 2007 (see Exhibited), when it was hung with other studies of this type by Plattemontagne, it was recognized as the work of Jean-Baptiste.
In his 2009 exhibition catalogue entry, Lanoë draws a close comparison with another self-portrait by Jean-Baptiste now in the Louvre.Executed in colored chalks and inscribed in black chalk: J.B. Champagne neveu de Ph de Champagne, there is no doubt about the shared identity of both sitters and the stylistic similarities in the handling of the chalk: '...qui montre la même douceur et un sentiment teinté de mélancolie...' .  The present sheet is the earliest known drawing by the artist.  It shows the strong influence of his uncle and master, Philippe de Champaigne, and can be closely compared with the latter's portraits of his own children, Catherine and Françoise (present whereabouts unknown).2  These three drawings, of similar dimensions, were all in the great collection of Gilbert Paignon-Dijonval (1708-1792), and could have been previously part of the same album.  

Jean-Baptiste de Champaigne entered his uncle's Parisian studio in 1643 at the age of twelve.  The present self-portrait, made when he was seventeen, shows an already accomplished and capable draughtsman.  As Lanoë writes in the 2009 exhibition catalogue entry: 'Á une date précoce, Jean Baptiste de Champaigne se montre capable de réaliser un portrait d'une belle autorité'.

 

1. Inv. no.18966; see Exhibited, 2009, p. 89, no. 66, reproduced p. 88. The drawing appears closely related to the Double Portrait of Jean-Baptiste de Champaigne and Nicolas de Plattemontagne, signed by both artists and now in the Boijmans van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam. For an illustration, see ibid., fig. 66a
2. Ibid., respectively: pp. 46-7, no. 23, reproduced fig. 23 and pp. 53-4, reproduced p. 53