Jacques Bellange

Private collection, New England

Hinged at the top. A repaired hole to the right of the head of St. Andrew, not very noticeable. Some light soiling and stains at the lower margin. Sold mounted and framed in a wooden, black and gilded old frame.
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This recently discovered drawing can be added to a number of sheets which are associated with Bellange's early career.  An incredible and highly individual and eccentric draughtsman, Bellange is mostly known through his drawings and engraving, rather than his painted oeuvre, which is almost entirely lost.  Not much is known of his beginning or training, but his name first appears in a contract in 1595, to reappear in 1602 when he was entrusted with an important commission for the ducal court of Nancy.¹  Bellange worked for the Duke of Lorrain from 1602 until 1616.  The fluent use of pen and ink in the present sheet is very comparable to Bellange's graphic style.  The very mannered composition, as well as some details in the execution, can easily be compared with a number of known drawings.  Sue Reed, from an image, has suggested, in an e-mail to the present owner, close similarities with several of Bellange's drawings including: the St. Sebastian, in the Jeffrey E. Horvitz collection, Boston,² where she observed similarity in the execution of the hands; a Battle Scene, the Adoration, and the Adoration of the Magi, three sheets in Munich, Staatliche Graphische Sammlung³ and the Deposition, in the Hermitage, St. Petersburg.⁴  The strokes used to indicate the shadows under the left leg of the kneeling St. Andrew, are very characteristic of the artist's style.

The present drawing seems to be a quick, preliminary idea for an altarpiece, executed solely with pen and two shades of brown ink.  Bellange has not here used any wash, although the use of delicately or vigorously applied wash is found in all the sheets mentioned above.  No painted work by the artist seems to relate to the present composition.

1. J. Thuillier, Jacques Bellange, exhib. cat., Rennes, Musée des Beaux-Arts, 2001, p. 13
2. Ibid., p. 136, no. 14, reproduced
3. Munich, Staatliche Graphische Sammlung, inv. nos:  2261, 2244, 1916.182; ibid., p. 146, p. 148, p. 232, nos. 19, 20, 53, reproduced
4. St. Petersburg, Hermitage, inv. no. 16012; ibid., p. 154, no. 23, reproduced