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Lot Essay
Harbor views sometimes turned into historical subjects have contributed a lot to Claude's great fame and the many boats that are depicted in his canvasses have since prompted general praise for their elegance, their variety, and their precise depiction. Yet drawn studies of boats by Claude are quite rare: they number only about ten of the more than eleven hundred known drawings by the artist (see M. Roethlisberger, Claude Lorrain. The Drawings, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1968, nos. 50, 83, 140, 159, 281, 282, 286, 396-99; see also Christie's, Paris, 29 March 2012, lot 85). These sheets are of two kinds: representations of large galleys on an often tumultuous sea and studies of more modest boats at anchor. The drawings from the first group are considered to be copies after compositions by earlier artists while those in the second group - to which the present lot is an addition - have been drawn from life. Sometimes, as is probably the case here, Claude would rework his drawing with brush and wash once he was back in his studio.
This drawing, like most of the other studies of boats, is dated to the second half of the 1630s by Marcel Roethlisberger and is not directly related to a painted composition. Claude seems to have wanted to produce a repertoire of images to be used in his paintings, modifying them as he wished. The present drawing can be especially compared to a sheet in the Teyler Museum, Haarlem of boats at anchor (Roethlisberger, op. cit., no. 398; Claude Gellée, dit le Lorrain. Le dessinateur face à la nature, exh. cat., Paris, Louvre and Haarlem, Teyler Museum, 2011-12, no. 15, ill. in color). In both drawings the artist has used a rather thick pen and has combined brown and grey wash in an unusual way. Both show the sea in the background, which probably indicates that they were not drawn on the Ripa Grande like most of the other studies of small boats (although the artist could have added this from his own invention in the studio) but in Civita Vecchia. Claude visited Civita Vecchia in 1638-39 on his way to Santa Marinella where he was sent by Pope Urban VIII to make sketches of the the site in order to prepare a painting now in the Petit Palais, Paris. At least six views of the harbor of Civita Vecchia survive (Roethlisberger, op. cit., nos. 310-16). The hills in the background of the present drawing could represent Monte Argentario.
We thank Marcel Roethlisberger for having confirmed the attribution from a digital photograph and for his help in cataloguing this drawing.
This drawing, like most of the other studies of boats, is dated to the second half of the 1630s by Marcel Roethlisberger and is not directly related to a painted composition. Claude seems to have wanted to produce a repertoire of images to be used in his paintings, modifying them as he wished. The present drawing can be especially compared to a sheet in the Teyler Museum, Haarlem of boats at anchor (Roethlisberger, op. cit., no. 398; Claude Gellée, dit le Lorrain. Le dessinateur face à la nature, exh. cat., Paris, Louvre and Haarlem, Teyler Museum, 2011-12, no. 15, ill. in color). In both drawings the artist has used a rather thick pen and has combined brown and grey wash in an unusual way. Both show the sea in the background, which probably indicates that they were not drawn on the Ripa Grande like most of the other studies of small boats (although the artist could have added this from his own invention in the studio) but in Civita Vecchia. Claude visited Civita Vecchia in 1638-39 on his way to Santa Marinella where he was sent by Pope Urban VIII to make sketches of the the site in order to prepare a painting now in the Petit Palais, Paris. At least six views of the harbor of Civita Vecchia survive (Roethlisberger, op. cit., nos. 310-16). The hills in the background of the present drawing could represent Monte Argentario.
We thank Marcel Roethlisberger for having confirmed the attribution from a digital photograph and for his help in cataloguing this drawing.