Jacob Jordaens Antwerp 1593-1678 and Studio

The following condition report has been provided by Simon Parkes of Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc. 502 East 74th St. New York, NY 212-734-3920, simonparkes@msn.com , an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. This painting has not been restored for a long time. The lining is old and the paint layer is stable. If the lining were to be reversed, some of the unstable areas of the paint layer could be re-adhered. The paint layer is extremely dirty, with a thin yellow varnish and some airborne dirt. If the paint layer were to be cleaned, some restorations would most likely be removed. However, in the trees, landscape and the figures of the animals and the people, the condition is extremely respectable. While restorations are expected to be necessary after cleaning and lining the paiting, the amount should not point to a condition which is anything other than respectable.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

This previously unpublished painting depicts the story of Mercury and Argus.   It is an episode in the complicated tale of Jupiter and Io, as recounted by Ovid in his Metamorphoses, I:568-746.  Io was a beautiful maiden whom Jupiter seduced and then transformed into a white heifer in order to hide her from his jealous wife, Juno.  However, Juno discovered the deception, and sent Argus, her 100-eyed watchman to guard the poor creature.  She was pastured near her family, but they naturally did not recognize her, and mourned her loss.  Eventually Jupiter took pity on Inachus, her father, and sent Mercury to free Io.  In the present work Jordaens shows Argus as an old man -- with only two eyes -- having just been lulled to sleep by Mercury's flute.  The god has dropped his instrument and is pulling his sword to kill the watchman, while behind them stands the heifer Io flanked by other cows.

The subject was popular in the Low Countries in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries and a theme that Jordaens returned to at various stages over the course of his long career.  The earliest version is a painting in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon, that D'Hulst dates to the beginning of the 1620s, which shows the three central figures and the dog in roughly the same relationship as here.¹  In 1646 he treated the subject in a more expansive form in a painting for Martinus van Langenhouven, documented in an engraving by Schelte à Bolswert, which has been identified with a painting in an American private collection.²  In that picture, Jordaens has extended the landscape at the left and right, while retaining the core grouping of the protagonists.  In the present painting he takes this still further, creating a denser background of trees and adding more cattle. He also enlarges the hillock behind Mercury, adding more weight to the central part of the composition.  Jordaens apparently made changes as he worked, for there are significant pentimenti, most notably below Mercury's feet, where he strove to get the correct positioning.  These along with the compositional differences strongly point to Mercury and Argus being an original composition by Jordaens rather than a studio replica after an as yet unknown painting. 

Mercury and Argus probably dates from the same period as Mercury Killing Argus, in a private collection, Brussels, of circa 1648-50.³  That work depicts the next moment in this story -- Mercury has drawn his sword and is about to kill the sleeping Argus.  It is set in a very similar landscape, filled with trees and cows. The figures are gathered into discrete groups that occupy a rather narrow shelf of space despite the broadness of the landscape and that lead our eyes slowly across the canvas.  The present work is, however, more focused, and the tension is greater.  Jordaens has directed the light onto the pale body of Mercury, which shines out from the dark vegetation.  The god fixes his eyes on Argus as he begins to draw his sword, while the sleeping watchman and his animal companions are all oblivious to the impending killing. 

1.  R. D'Hulst in Jacob Jordaens (1593-1678), Tableaux et tapisseries, exhibition catalogue Antwerp 1993, p. 108, no. A26.  There are two closely related versions of this painting in the Musée d'Art Wallon, Liège, and the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne.
2.  D'Hulst, Op.cit., pp. 108-110, under A26, reproduced and with other versions of the composition.
3.  D'Hulst, Op. cit., p. 240, A77, reproduced.