Lot n° 160
Estimation :
15000 - 20000
EUR
Result with fees
Result
: 19 500EUR
Attributed to Gaspard GRESLY (1712-1756) - Lot 160
Attributed to Gaspard GRESLY (1712-1756)
Trompe-l'oeil with engraving of Democritus and
Trompe-l'oeil with engraving of Heraclitus weeping
Pair of oils on canvas
H. 46 x L. 38 cm (each)
(faded)
An 18th-century painter from the Franche-Comté region, Gaspard Gresly produced
genre scenes in chiaroscuro and striking trompe-l'œil. His
trompe-l'œil usually depict engravings on a fir-tree background, as
background, as shown here. The first reproduces an engraving by Antoine Coypel
from 1692, illustrating Democritus, which the artist painted the same year (canvas
Musée du Louvre, no. IM 1048); the original engraving by
by Coypel is kept in the Cabinet des Estampes of the Bibliothèque Nationale
Nationale Db6 folio, f°21). This engraving is a recurring subject in Gresly's
Gresly's trompe-l'œil, which he often confronts with his counterpart Heraclitus.
Indeed, Democritus' laughter is often contrasted with Heraclitus' weeping.
As for the wise men, Heraclitus and Democritus, they fought anger,
one by weeping, the other by laughing". (Stobaeus, Miscellany, III, XX, 53).
In addition, the pair of paintings we are presenting is part of a current
the Musée Marmottant-Monet has just closed the exhibition
exhibition "Le trompe-l'œil, de 1520 à nos jours", which featured a work by
a work by Gresly.
Although adopted by the Académie française in the 19th century, the term
the term trompe-l'œil is linked to a much older account by Pliny the Elder
by Pliny the Elder (c.23-79 AD), who relates in his Natural History
how the painter Zeuxis (464-398 B.C.), in a competition with the
competition with the painter Parrhasios, had painted grapes so perfect
that birds flocked around them. While this art form has evolved through
mediums over the centuries, it was in the 18th century that it reached its apogee
with painters such as Gaspard Gresly and Louis-Léopold
Boilly
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