Claude-Joseph Vernet

From an album probably compiled in Vienna in the early 19th century;
A.A. Renouard, Paris,
his sale, Paris, 10 November 1854, lot 628 (to Potier, antiquarian bookseller, quai Malaquais);
Sale, Versailles, Maître Blache, 13 March 1966

Framed. Nothing on the verso. Slight foxing spots. One brown ink spot recto visible in illustration
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This and the following lot come from an album of drawings by Vernet which was probably compiled in Vienna in the early 19th century before appearing in Paris in the sale of Antoine Augustin Renouard in 1854.  It was broken up in a sale in 1966, and many of the drawings are now in private and public collections in Europe and America.  Most of the drawings were in pen and ink and wash, although a few were red chalk. Many were on mounts inscribed in a possibly German hand, Vernett (see the following lot where the inscription is on the drawing itself).  Many were inscribed by the artist with identification of the locations.  They were in fine condition, having been preserved in the album.

Another album, probably from the same source and bearing the same inscriptions, is in the Albertina, received in 1919 from the personal collection of the Emperor Ferdinand I.  It has been suggested that both albums were compiled from the nearly 700 drawings included in the posthumous sale of the artist's studio in 1789.

Vernet went to Rome in 1734  and  although he did not attend the French Academy, he was able to study with Vleughels and Manglard who encouraged his work as a landscape artist.  He travelled frequently to Naples, and it is clear that the city and its coastline were his source of continual inspiration when he returned to France and made his name as a marine painter.  Philip Conisbee suggested that the drawings of Naples, which are inscribed by the artist, may have been made on a tour during the summer of 1750, when there is a gap in Vernet's Roman account book. ¹

 

1. Philip Conisbee, Claude-Joseph Vernet, exhib. cat., London, Kenwood, et al., 1976, no page number