Old Masters

Provenance:
Hyppolyte de Livry.
His sale; Paris, 2-5 Feb. 1814, lot 225a (420 ffr.)
Anon. sale; Paris, 1-9 Dec. 1814, lot 18 (371 ffr. to Robiquet).
Comte Daupias de Lisbonne.
His sale; Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 16 May 1892, lot 59.
Comte R. de Quélen, Paris.
His sale; Hôtel Drouot, Paris, 9-10 Dec. 1931, lot 22.
Comtesse de Q[uélen], Paris.
Her sale; Galerie Charpentier, Paris, 9 June 1936, lot 34.
Anon. sale; Paris, 1967, lot number unknown.
Galerie Pardo, Paris, by 1974.
Private Collection, UK, acquired from the above in the early 1980s; and by descent.
Their sale; Sotheby’s, New York, 25 Jan. 2007, lot 104 (unsold).

Literature:
Salon de Peinture, exh. cat., Paris, 1799, p. 16, no. 316.
P. Marmottan, L’École Française de peinture, 1789 – 1830, Paris, 1886, p. 266.
‘Au Palais Strozzi’, in Connaissance des Arts, Sept. 1967, p. 51 (illus.)
F. Cummings, et al., De David à Delacroix: la peinture francaise de 1774 à 1830, exh. cat., Grand Palais, Paris, 1975, p. 633.
F. Cummings, et al., French Painting 1774 – 1830: The Age of Revolution, exh. cat., The Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MI, 1975, p. 640.
J.-F. Heim, C. Béraud and P. Heim, Les Salons de Peinture de la Révolution Française, 1789 – 1799, Paris, 1989, p. 367.

Exhibited:
Paris, Salon de Peinture, 1799, no. 316.

 

Jacques-Antoine Vallin entered the French Academy school circa 1775, where he was taught by Claude Drevet and Antoine-François Callet, among others. He is best known for mythological scenes such as this one, although he also painted portraits. In Hellenistic religion, Hymen was the son of Apollo and one of the muses, and was considered the god of marriage ceremonies. Here, two young lovers are escorted by winged putti bearing garlands of flowers to the temple to consecrate their love. Vallin’s elegant, Academic style relies on painterly colouring and sensitive effects of light and shadow.

Th De Quélen family was one of the oldest and most important families in Brittany, having been granted a baronetcy in 1512. Significant members included Jean Claude de Quélen, who served in the Royal Navy during the reign of Louis XV (as Capitaine des vaisseaux du roi). He participated in the Seven Years War and the American Revolution. His son, Hyacinthe-Louis de Quélen (1778 – 1839), was an Archbishop of Paris and a French intellectual favoured by Louis XVIII and Charles X.