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Lot Essay
‘Pomona lived in good King Proca’s reign
And none of all the Latin woodland-nymphs
Was cleverer than she in garden lore
Nor keener in the care of orchard trees.
Thence came her name. For in her heart she loved
Not woods nor rivers but a plot of ground
And boughs of smiling apples all around.’
THE MYTH OF POMONA
Pomona, a gorgeous, good-hearted and hard-working gardener, devoted to her walled orchards, is described by Ovid in his book XIV of Metamorphoses. Besieged by suiters, she was interested only in pruning, grafting and nurturing her magnificent trees and gardens. Pomona is eternally linked to the flourishing of the fruit trees and vines and their produce. Hence the splendid pile of fruits and vegetables at the feet of the San Francisco Pomona. Ovid further narrates how Vertumnus, the god of the changing seasons, managed to finally seduce Pomona by disguising himself as an old woman in order to enter her private garden. Vertumnus’ most celebrated line, both charming and a bit threatening, is when he warns Pomona that Venus, the goddess of love, ‘hates a stony heart’. Supposedly, after his convincing story, Vertumnus lifts his mask revealing his handsome self and Pomona agrees to marry him. Vertumnus, usually depicted as an old woman, is perhaps here represented with a more humorous twist as the winged putto removing his mask. Another possibility is that there was a companion statue, depicting an age-appropriate Vertumnus, that would have been paired with Pomona, which has yet to be discovered.
POMONA: THE PRIZE AND PRIDE OF ARISTOCRATS AND ARTISTS
Pomona has always attracted many admirers. We know this from Ovid. But some of those drawn to Pomona are not only men of myth – but well-documented historical figures. Pomona was commissioned by one of the most sophisticated and grandest of Ancien Régime aristocrats and eventually ended being ‘discovered’ in the later 20th century by a cutting-edge curator on the California coast.
THE COMTE D'ARGENSON AND THE CHATEAU DE NEUILLY
Pomona was probably commissioned by the Comte Marc-Pierre de Voyer d'Argenson (1696-1764) in 1753 to decorate his potager, or ‘kitchen garden’ at the château de Neuilly. It was sculpted by Jean-Baptiste Dupont (d. 1754), of whom little is known, and who died the year after Pomona was finished. Dupont was, at the time, teaching at the Académie of Saint Luc in Paris for which d’Argenson was the patron. The Académie, which also had a parallel institution in Rome, was the former corporation of the Parisian painters and sculptors that was transformed into a teaching institution (Y. Combeau, op. cit., p. 438). The first official exhibition was held in 1751 at the Grand-Augustins and two years later, in 1753, the plaster of the present Pomona figure was exhibited. Dupont’s Pomona clearly attracted notice as it was highlighted in the review of the exhibition. (Affiches, annonces, et avis divers, Paris, 26 June 1753, p. 103). The present limestone version was then shortly thereafter at d’Argenson’s château de Neuilly.
The Comte d’Argenson was a man of many abilities and wide-ranging interests. He was an important and powerful politician and, for twenty years was at the center of both the French court and government. He had succeeded his father, Marc-René de Voyer de Paulmy d'Argenson, as lieutenant-general of the Paris police. Then, in a series of dizzyingly high-profile and rapidly ascending appointments, d’Argenson was appointed Conseilleur d’Etat and Président du Grand Conseil (November, 1738), intendant of the généralité of Paris (August, 1740) and was admitted to Louis XV's Conseil du Roi (August, 1742). In January of 1743, d'Argenson was appointed secrétaire d'État de la Guerre, a particularly challenging position as France was in the middle of the War of the Austrian Succession.
While all of d’Argenson’s political appointments were impressive, it is probably for his intellectual and artistic contributions that he will be best remembered. An extremely curious mind, he was a renowned bibliophile and patron of the humanities and his salons collected the leading Enlightenment figures such as Voltaire, Diderot and d’Alembert. And, as if that were not enough affirmation, Diderot dedicated his Encyclopédie to d’Argenson.
While d’Argenson had bought the land in Neuilly in 1741, it was not until ten years later, in 1751, that he commissioned the architect Jean-Sylvain Carteau, to begin work on the château. The château’s interiors were an early example of neo-classicism, well before it became the established taste of the later 18th century and included paintings by Fragonard and Boucher – but it was the gardens that attracted perhaps even more attention.
‘Cool shades, thick and quiet forests,
Superb Palaces, exquisite objects
Rich gardens, delights for the eyes
Ah! You would be the true land of the gods
If only your masters would inhabit your refuges…’
(‘Ombrages frais, bois epais et tranquilles,
Palais superbes, objets delicieux
Jardins fertiles, charme des yeux
Ah! Vous seriez le vrai sejours des dieux
Si votre maître habitait ces asiles…’)
These verses were written about the gardens of the château de Neuilly, famous even two hundred years later (Favart, Essai d’une histoire illustree de Neuilly-sur-Seine, 1935). Contemporary 18th century visitors, such as Marie Leczinska, the wife of King Louis XV, were also charmed by the gardens (Y. Combeau, op. cit., p. 424). Antoine Joseph Dezallier d’Argenville specifically noted that the potager ‘must not be missed’ (‘Vous passerez devant un potager qu’il ne faut pas oublier de voir’; A. J. Dezallier d’Argenville, Voyage Pittoresque des environs de Paris, Paris, 1755, pp. 4-6). In his chapter on Neuilly, Combeau also notes ‘la preciosité toute rococo de ce petit potager’ (Ibid.). Pomona would certainly have fit in with this elegant and sophisticated ‘kitchen' garden. As the last line of Favart’s verse above suggests, d’Argenson probably only was able to enjoy the château and its gardens for several years as in 1757 he was exiled to his other estate, the château des Ormes, for his outspoken opposition to what he considered Madame de Pompadour’s interference in military affairs. In an odd coincidence, in another version of Pomona and Vertumnus, sculpted only three years later in 1760 by Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne and now in the Louvre, Madame de Pompadour is depicted as Pomona to celebrate her playing the role of Pomona in an intimate performance at Versailles. While her dislike of d’Argenson was clear, perhaps she was influenced by the present Pomona, as it was an unusual and little depicted subject in contemporary French 18th century sculpture.
VICTORIEN SARDOU AND MARLY-LE-ROI, DUVEEN AND SAN FRANCISCO
After the death of d’Argenson and the political upheavals of late 18th and early 19th century France, it is not until the Belle Époque that Pomona resurfaces. After having been ‘lost’ Pomona appears in the sale of the collection of Victorien Sardou in 1909 described in his Drouot sale catalogue as ‘a young woman draped, holding a mirror and accompanied by a putto handing her a mask’ (‘une jeune femme drapée, tenant un mirroir et accompagnée d’un amour lui tendant un masque’).
Victorien Sardou (1831-1908) was described in his obituary in the New York Times as ‘France’s greatest and most prolific contemporary dramatist’ (‘Victorien Sardou, Dramatist, Dead’, New York Times, November 9, 1908). A character straight out of one of his plays, Sardou’s life was dramatic in the extreme: the loss of the family estate after a night’s frost ruined the olive harvest cast him out into the world and what followed was a descent into poverty, extreme illness in a Paris garret and then, finally, spectacular recognition of his talents followed by fame and fortune. Even if his earlier lack of income prohibited collecting, his diaries reveal his passion for the antiquaires in Paris had been burning all along (G. Mouly, La vie prodigieuse de Victorien Sardou, Paris, 1931, pp. 89-90). After his success, particularly his plays with roles written specifically for Sara Bernhardt, Sardou was able to collect on a grand scale and Pomona was moved to his château du Verduron at Marly-le-Roi where it remained until his death.
Pomona was probably bought by Sir Joseph Duveen (1869-1939), the celebrated dealer, at the 1909 sale, although it only appears in their 1955 New York inventories with the mention of the Sardou collection. In the Duveen archives Pomona was attributed to Jean-Louis Lemoyne probably because of geographical proximity with the château de Marly and Lemoyne had indeed supplied a group of Pomona and Vertumnus to Marly. But, as Michael Conforti noted, it was François Souchal who correctly identified Pomona as being by Jean-Baptiste Dupont with reference to a sculpture of ‘Pomone avec le génie de Vertumne qui se découvre en levant son masque et le tenant à la main’ (S. Lami, op. cit.).
In 1960, Walter Heil, the curator of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, negotiated the exchange of six pieces of furniture for Pomona. Heil was well-known for his audacious taste combined with a thorough connoisseurship and, as he was trained by the great W. R. Valentiner, sculpture was his special interest and Pomona became, at the time, the only garden sculpture then owned by the museum (M. Conforti, op. cit.).
The story does not end here as Pomona, well-loved and well-traveled, will again find a new home.
And none of all the Latin woodland-nymphs
Was cleverer than she in garden lore
Nor keener in the care of orchard trees.
Thence came her name. For in her heart she loved
Not woods nor rivers but a plot of ground
And boughs of smiling apples all around.’
THE MYTH OF POMONA
Pomona, a gorgeous, good-hearted and hard-working gardener, devoted to her walled orchards, is described by Ovid in his book XIV of Metamorphoses. Besieged by suiters, she was interested only in pruning, grafting and nurturing her magnificent trees and gardens. Pomona is eternally linked to the flourishing of the fruit trees and vines and their produce. Hence the splendid pile of fruits and vegetables at the feet of the San Francisco Pomona. Ovid further narrates how Vertumnus, the god of the changing seasons, managed to finally seduce Pomona by disguising himself as an old woman in order to enter her private garden. Vertumnus’ most celebrated line, both charming and a bit threatening, is when he warns Pomona that Venus, the goddess of love, ‘hates a stony heart’. Supposedly, after his convincing story, Vertumnus lifts his mask revealing his handsome self and Pomona agrees to marry him. Vertumnus, usually depicted as an old woman, is perhaps here represented with a more humorous twist as the winged putto removing his mask. Another possibility is that there was a companion statue, depicting an age-appropriate Vertumnus, that would have been paired with Pomona, which has yet to be discovered.
POMONA: THE PRIZE AND PRIDE OF ARISTOCRATS AND ARTISTS
Pomona has always attracted many admirers. We know this from Ovid. But some of those drawn to Pomona are not only men of myth – but well-documented historical figures. Pomona was commissioned by one of the most sophisticated and grandest of Ancien Régime aristocrats and eventually ended being ‘discovered’ in the later 20th century by a cutting-edge curator on the California coast.
THE COMTE D'ARGENSON AND THE CHATEAU DE NEUILLY
Pomona was probably commissioned by the Comte Marc-Pierre de Voyer d'Argenson (1696-1764) in 1753 to decorate his potager, or ‘kitchen garden’ at the château de Neuilly. It was sculpted by Jean-Baptiste Dupont (d. 1754), of whom little is known, and who died the year after Pomona was finished. Dupont was, at the time, teaching at the Académie of Saint Luc in Paris for which d’Argenson was the patron. The Académie, which also had a parallel institution in Rome, was the former corporation of the Parisian painters and sculptors that was transformed into a teaching institution (Y. Combeau, op. cit., p. 438). The first official exhibition was held in 1751 at the Grand-Augustins and two years later, in 1753, the plaster of the present Pomona figure was exhibited. Dupont’s Pomona clearly attracted notice as it was highlighted in the review of the exhibition. (Affiches, annonces, et avis divers, Paris, 26 June 1753, p. 103). The present limestone version was then shortly thereafter at d’Argenson’s château de Neuilly.
The Comte d’Argenson was a man of many abilities and wide-ranging interests. He was an important and powerful politician and, for twenty years was at the center of both the French court and government. He had succeeded his father, Marc-René de Voyer de Paulmy d'Argenson, as lieutenant-general of the Paris police. Then, in a series of dizzyingly high-profile and rapidly ascending appointments, d’Argenson was appointed Conseilleur d’Etat and Président du Grand Conseil (November, 1738), intendant of the généralité of Paris (August, 1740) and was admitted to Louis XV's Conseil du Roi (August, 1742). In January of 1743, d'Argenson was appointed secrétaire d'État de la Guerre, a particularly challenging position as France was in the middle of the War of the Austrian Succession.
While all of d’Argenson’s political appointments were impressive, it is probably for his intellectual and artistic contributions that he will be best remembered. An extremely curious mind, he was a renowned bibliophile and patron of the humanities and his salons collected the leading Enlightenment figures such as Voltaire, Diderot and d’Alembert. And, as if that were not enough affirmation, Diderot dedicated his Encyclopédie to d’Argenson.
While d’Argenson had bought the land in Neuilly in 1741, it was not until ten years later, in 1751, that he commissioned the architect Jean-Sylvain Carteau, to begin work on the château. The château’s interiors were an early example of neo-classicism, well before it became the established taste of the later 18th century and included paintings by Fragonard and Boucher – but it was the gardens that attracted perhaps even more attention.
‘Cool shades, thick and quiet forests,
Superb Palaces, exquisite objects
Rich gardens, delights for the eyes
Ah! You would be the true land of the gods
If only your masters would inhabit your refuges…’
(‘Ombrages frais, bois epais et tranquilles,
Palais superbes, objets delicieux
Jardins fertiles, charme des yeux
Ah! Vous seriez le vrai sejours des dieux
Si votre maître habitait ces asiles…’)
These verses were written about the gardens of the château de Neuilly, famous even two hundred years later (Favart, Essai d’une histoire illustree de Neuilly-sur-Seine, 1935). Contemporary 18th century visitors, such as Marie Leczinska, the wife of King Louis XV, were also charmed by the gardens (Y. Combeau, op. cit., p. 424). Antoine Joseph Dezallier d’Argenville specifically noted that the potager ‘must not be missed’ (‘Vous passerez devant un potager qu’il ne faut pas oublier de voir’; A. J. Dezallier d’Argenville, Voyage Pittoresque des environs de Paris, Paris, 1755, pp. 4-6). In his chapter on Neuilly, Combeau also notes ‘la preciosité toute rococo de ce petit potager’ (Ibid.). Pomona would certainly have fit in with this elegant and sophisticated ‘kitchen' garden. As the last line of Favart’s verse above suggests, d’Argenson probably only was able to enjoy the château and its gardens for several years as in 1757 he was exiled to his other estate, the château des Ormes, for his outspoken opposition to what he considered Madame de Pompadour’s interference in military affairs. In an odd coincidence, in another version of Pomona and Vertumnus, sculpted only three years later in 1760 by Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne and now in the Louvre, Madame de Pompadour is depicted as Pomona to celebrate her playing the role of Pomona in an intimate performance at Versailles. While her dislike of d’Argenson was clear, perhaps she was influenced by the present Pomona, as it was an unusual and little depicted subject in contemporary French 18th century sculpture.
VICTORIEN SARDOU AND MARLY-LE-ROI, DUVEEN AND SAN FRANCISCO
After the death of d’Argenson and the political upheavals of late 18th and early 19th century France, it is not until the Belle Époque that Pomona resurfaces. After having been ‘lost’ Pomona appears in the sale of the collection of Victorien Sardou in 1909 described in his Drouot sale catalogue as ‘a young woman draped, holding a mirror and accompanied by a putto handing her a mask’ (‘une jeune femme drapée, tenant un mirroir et accompagnée d’un amour lui tendant un masque’).
Victorien Sardou (1831-1908) was described in his obituary in the New York Times as ‘France’s greatest and most prolific contemporary dramatist’ (‘Victorien Sardou, Dramatist, Dead’, New York Times, November 9, 1908). A character straight out of one of his plays, Sardou’s life was dramatic in the extreme: the loss of the family estate after a night’s frost ruined the olive harvest cast him out into the world and what followed was a descent into poverty, extreme illness in a Paris garret and then, finally, spectacular recognition of his talents followed by fame and fortune. Even if his earlier lack of income prohibited collecting, his diaries reveal his passion for the antiquaires in Paris had been burning all along (G. Mouly, La vie prodigieuse de Victorien Sardou, Paris, 1931, pp. 89-90). After his success, particularly his plays with roles written specifically for Sara Bernhardt, Sardou was able to collect on a grand scale and Pomona was moved to his château du Verduron at Marly-le-Roi where it remained until his death.
Pomona was probably bought by Sir Joseph Duveen (1869-1939), the celebrated dealer, at the 1909 sale, although it only appears in their 1955 New York inventories with the mention of the Sardou collection. In the Duveen archives Pomona was attributed to Jean-Louis Lemoyne probably because of geographical proximity with the château de Marly and Lemoyne had indeed supplied a group of Pomona and Vertumnus to Marly. But, as Michael Conforti noted, it was François Souchal who correctly identified Pomona as being by Jean-Baptiste Dupont with reference to a sculpture of ‘Pomone avec le génie de Vertumne qui se découvre en levant son masque et le tenant à la main’ (S. Lami, op. cit.).
In 1960, Walter Heil, the curator of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, negotiated the exchange of six pieces of furniture for Pomona. Heil was well-known for his audacious taste combined with a thorough connoisseurship and, as he was trained by the great W. R. Valentiner, sculpture was his special interest and Pomona became, at the time, the only garden sculpture then owned by the museum (M. Conforti, op. cit.).
The story does not end here as Pomona, well-loved and well-traveled, will again find a new home.