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Aubert-Henri-Joseph Parent (1753-1835) French, dated 1782
Description
- Allegorical relief with portrait of Catherine the Great
- signed and dated PARENT A ????S AN 1782
- lindenwood
- Aubert-Henri-Joseph Parent (1753-1835) French, dated 1782
Provenance
by descent to the great great grandmother of the present owner, Castle of Cressier, near Fribourg, Switzerland
by descent to the historian Gonzague de Reynold
by descent to Sabine de Muralt, granddaughter of above
Exhibited
Literature
Stanislas Lami, Dictionnaire des Sculpteurs de l'Ecole Française au Dix-Huitième Siècle, vol. II, Paris, 1911, p. 225
Colin Streeter, 'Two Carved Reliefs by Aubert Parent', in The J. Paul Getty Museum Journal, vol. 13, 1985, pp. 61 and 62
Condition
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.
Catalogue Note
Mark Cruse and Hilde Hoogenboom, trans., The Memoirs of Catherine the Great, New York, 2005
This important and accomplished lindenwood relief by Aubert-Henri-Joseph Parent was exhibited by the artist in 1783 at the Salon de la Correspondance. Decorated with his characteristically intricate and naturalistic floral motifs as well as symbols of Russian imperial power, the relief is centered by a portrait of Empress Catherine the Great and inscribed EKA BTO on either side, an abbreviation of Екатерина Вторая, Catherine the Second in Russian. The Empress is depicted as Minerva, the Roman patron goddess of the arts. The portrait surmounts a mother bird feeding her young, symbolizing the empress’s maternal tenderness for her subjects. This fine relief exemplifies Parent's expert use of undercutting and micro-carving techniques to render the vibrancy and delicacy of nature. Here the artist is able to reproduce the variation of color values found in paintings by using a gradation, from shallow carving, with mere indications of form, to the deeply undercut high relief.
The portrait of the empress is based on a medal dated June 28, 1762 on the reverse in Cyrillic by the German medalist Johann Georg Waechter, who lived for some time in Saint Petersburg. Catherine's official coronation did not occur until September 12, 1762; thus the medal instead commemorated the beginning of the palace coup which would put her in sole power of Russia. In 1774, Jean Pierre Ador, one of the best known jewelers in Saint Petersburg, made thirty gold snuff boxes embellished with a gold version of the medal to be distributed to Catherine's supporters, one of which, shown here in fig. 1, is in the collection of the State Hermitage Museum.
Catherine understood the importance of image in politics and carefully cultivated a particular vision of antiquity, attempting to recapture in her empire the grandeur of Rome. She was hailed as a patron of the arts and literature, styling herself “Minerva of the North” and often depicted in the guise of the goddess. She began collecting art in 1764 with the purchase of a group of paintings originally assembled by Berlin merchant Johann Ernst Gotzkowsky for Frederick II, the King of Prussia. Her collection became the core of the Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg which grew as she continued to acquire the best art available from the heirs of well-known collectors. As the Hermitage's holdings became larger she also commissioned her court architects, Yury Felten and Jean-Baptiste Vallin de la Mothe, to add to the original exhibition space in the Winter Palace.
Parent became a royal favorite in his native France in 1777 when King Louis XVI received a relief panel by the artist as a gift at a ceremony commemorating the centennial of Valenciennes' return to French territory. The king later placed the relief in the salle à manger intérieure at Versailles. Now preserved in the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Valenciennes, the relief features a nest of hatchlings and a mother bird keeping watch, similar to the group in the present relief. The king’s subsequent enthusiastic and public support garnered Parent a number of important commissions from the court. Some scholars believe that the appearance of the present relief indicates that the artist visited Saint Petersburg where he would have carved the panel as a tribute to Catherine. No other evidence for this visit exists, however, and he may simply have carved this portrait of the well-known Empress from France, perhaps as a state gift. In fact Parent carved a number of portraits of the crowned heads of Europe. A panel in the Historisches Museum in Basel dated 1792 (inv. no. 1955.293) features Parent's signature flowers and a portrait medallion of Louis XVI, carved just one year before the king's execution.
Over the course of his career, Parent described himself as a sculptor, designer, and architect. He was born in Cambrai in northern France and his patrons were in large part local aristocrats with connections to the French court. Furthering his connection to the crown, he repeated family lore that they had descended from Pierre Parent, secretary of state under Louis XI in the 15th century. Parent often worked in lindenwood, also called limewood, a soft material which was favored by many European wood carvers for its neutral color and subtle grain. His exceptionally fine reliefs in this material became iconic of the artist's work.
Parent travelled to Italy from 1784-1788 on a royal stipend, where he observed and absorbed the aesthetic of classical architecture. It is on this basis that he would come to style himself an architect. His interest in ancient history endured through the rest of his life: Parent continued to study Roman ruins, published on ancient art, and directed local excavations in Switzerland and Germany, to which he fled during the French Revolution. He became an associate member of the Academy of the Arts in Berlin in 1797.
The sculptor returned to France in 1813 to teach architecture at the Academy and collaborated on architectural projects until his death in 1835.