Appraisal and Evaluation

  • Nathan T. Whitman
Chapter

Abstract

Although Raymond Lafage lived a short and obscure life, largely unnoticed by the artistic world of his day, such neglect was not the case after his death. Then his reputation soared, and his drawings were to be found in the most eminent collections of the eighteenth century. As a chapter in the history of taste Lafage is most worthy of study, especially since the violent fluctuation of his reputation was not merely the result of superficial popular fashin. The fact that his work was praised and bought by the keenest men of taste in one of the most tasteful of all centuries makes one think that the reasons for his popularity must be closely related to the general social history of the period.

Keywords

Eighteenth Century Modern Artist English Amateur Great Collection Violent Fluctuation 
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Notes

  1. 1.
    Mariette, Abecedario, III, 39.Google Scholar
  2. 2.
    Des l’année 1683, c’est à dire dans le temps qu’il était encore à Toulouse, il avait commencé à acquérir des dessins de la Fage,“ Mariette, Description sommaire des dessins du cabinet de feu M. Crozat,pp. v-vi.Google Scholar
  3. 3.
    Ibid., p. 524, no. 1049.Google Scholar
  4. 4.
    Ibid., p. 126.Google Scholar
  5. 5.
    Information taken from the annotated copy of this catalogue in the Bibliothèque Nationale.Google Scholar
  6. 6.
    Mireur, Dictionnaire des ventes d’art,IV, 139-140.Google Scholar
  7. 7.
    Le dessin français dans les collections du XVIIIe siècle, preface by Henri Focillon (Paris, 1935), p.Google Scholar
  8. 8.
    Mireur, Dictionnaire des ventes d’art,IV, 140.Google Scholar
  9. 9.
    Charles Blanc, Histoire des peintres: Ecole française,III (Paris, 1565), appendix, 56–57.Google Scholar
  10. 10.
    Giovanni Bottari, Recueil de lettres sur la peinture, la sculpture, et l’architecture,translated by L. J. Jay (Paris, 1817), p. 567.Google Scholar
  11. 11.
    M. J. Dumesnil, Histoire des plus célèbres amateurs français (Paris, 1856 ), III, 371.Google Scholar
  12. 12.
    Count Francesco Algarotti, Opere (Leghorn, 5764–65), II, 175 ff.Google Scholar
  13. 13.
    Blunt, French Drawings,p. 6.Google Scholar
  14. 14.
    Nymphs Surprised by Satyrs, a pen drawing cut to a rough oval, might be by Boitard. Prudence, Justice and Fortitude, a crowded and not very attractive work in red chalk and pink wash, seems earlier than Lafage and may possibly be associated with Nicolas de La Fage.Google Scholar
  15. 15.
    Lugt, Marques de collections,pp. 127, 391.Google Scholar
  16. 16.
    Another English collector who can be added to this roster is Richard Houlditch, a director of the South Seas Company who died at Hampstead in 1736. His initials appear on a drawing by Lafage of Atlas Supporting the Earth in the Victoria and Albert Museum. See Lugt, Marques de collections, p. 415.Google Scholar
  17. 17.
    See ch. II, note 53.Google Scholar
  18. 18.
    Lugt, Marques de collections, Supplément (The Hague, 1956), p. 87.Google Scholar
  19. 19.
    Lugt, Marques de collections,pp. 535-536. Albertina inv. no. 11886.Google Scholar
  20. 20.
    Information contributed by the authorities of the Albertina.Google Scholar
  21. 21.
    Olgerd Grosswald, Der Kupferstich des XVIII Jahrhunderts in Augsburg und Nürnberg (Munich, 1912), p. 54.Google Scholar
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    Illa Budde, Beschreibender Katalog der Handzeichnungen in der staatlichen Kunstakademie Düsseldorf (Düsseldorf, 5930), p. vii.Google Scholar
  23. 23.
    Recueil de 44 Pièces imitées à l’Eau forte d’après Raym. Lafage, tirées de la Collection de l’Académie des beaux-arts à Düsseldorf. This extremely rare folio was the fourth volume in a series illustrating the paintings and drawings owned by the Düsseldorf Academy in the late eighteenth century. The folio completely reproduces the sketchbook, a most interesting collection of drawings that is worthy of further study. Much of the subject matter is baffling, and the style, too, seems at times unusual because of the almost mannerist overtones. Many little schematized figures, like those in the depiction of the Captain, appear on these pages; but here they are less angular, more sweeping, and rather elegant.Google Scholar
  24. 24.
    Christian Schuchardt, Goethes Kunstsammlungen (Jena, 1848), I, 317–318.Google Scholar
  25. 25.
    Van der Bruggen, p. 4.Google Scholar
  26. 26.
    Ibid., p. 4.Google Scholar
  27. 27.
    Les oeuvres posthumes de M. de La Fontaine (Paris, 1696), pp. 168–169.Google Scholar
  28. 28.
    Oeuvres de La Fontaine, edited by Henri Régnier, IX (Paris, 1892), 83–88.Google Scholar
  29. 29.
    Mariette, Abecedario, III,38–39.Google Scholar
  30. 30.
    Mariette, Description sommaire des dessins du cabinet de feu M. Crozat,pp. 124–126.Google Scholar
  31. 31.
    Bottari, Recueil de lettres,p. 570.Google Scholar
  32. 32.
    Comte Ann Claude Philippe de Caylus, “Conférence sur les dessins,” Revue universelle des arts,IX (1859), 314–323.Google Scholar
  33. 33.
    Pp. 99–101.Google Scholar
  34. 34.
    Sir Joshua Reynolds, Discourses (London, 1924), pp. 198–219. Passage on Lafage p. zos.Google Scholar
  35. 35.
    Richard Payne Knight, An Analytical Inquiry into the Principles of Taste, 3rd ed. (London, 1806), p. 104.Google Scholar
  36. 36.
    Johann Winckelmann, Gedanken über die Nachahmung der griechischen Werke in der Malerei und Bildhauerkunst (Dresden, 1755), pp. 25–26.Google Scholar
  37. 37.
    Alfred Kamphausen, Asmus Jakob Carstens (Neumünster in Holstein, 1941), pp. 71-72, 75, 87.Google Scholar
  38. 38.
    Frédéric Reiset, Notice des dessins du Louvre (Paris, 1869 ), II, 342–345.Google Scholar
  39. 39.
    Chennevières-Pointel, Recherches sur la vie et les ouvrages de quelques peintres provinciaux de l’ancienne France, II, 229–264. For Blanc, see note 9.Google Scholar
  40. 40.
    VI, 611–612.Google Scholar
  41. 41.
    Pierre Lavallée, Le dessin français (Paris, 1948), p. 58.Google Scholar
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    Charles de Tolnay, History and Technique of Old Master Drawings, p. 76.Google Scholar
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    Alphonse Wyatt, “Le ‘Libro dei disegni’ de Vasari,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts, IV (1859), 339–340.Google Scholar
  44. 44.
    The whole problem of the emergence of the drawing as a clearly separate art form is very complex and has never been adequately explored. De Tolnay’s short account refers largely to southern Europe and fails to distinguish in a precise fashion between the intentions of the artists and the attitudes of the collectors. Most of Rembrandt’s numerous drawings, for example, are self-sufficient works of art and were in most cases not executed as studies for painted or etched compositions. Yet at the same time they remained in his possession and were not used as objects of financial gain by the artist, an attitude somewhat comparable to that of Watteau in France a century later. See Otto Benesch, Rembrandt as a Draughtsman, London, 1960, and Jakob Rosenberg, Great Draughtsmen, Cambridge, Mass., 1960.Google Scholar

Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 1963

Authors and Affiliations

  • Nathan T. Whitman
    • 1
  1. 1.The University of MichiganAnn ArborUSA

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