Claude Gillot

This exciting and exotic compositional drawing by Gillot is one of a set of four allegorical representations of the Continents: three are offered in this sale (see also the two following lots, for the representations of America and Europe) while the fourth, the double-sided Allegory of Africa, is, as Dr. Jennifer Tonkovich has kindly informed us, in the collection of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris.¹ Tonkovich has also pointed out that a red chalk tracing of the present sheet is in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, and was illustrated in her informative recent article on the drawings by Gillot and his circle in Stockholm.²

Though the project for which these allegories were drawn remains unidentified, Tonkovich suggests that these refined designs were most probably executed in preparation for decorative works. The large vertical format points to their being designs for wall panels or even tapestries, perhaps part of a collaborative project with Claude III Audran (1658-1734). Gillot also treated the popular subject of The Four Continents in other drawings, including a group of horizontal studies, possibly related to decorative panels for overdoors, now in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, and a series of five related sheets in the Kunstbibliothek, Berlin.³

In this lavish representation of Asia, the central allegorical female figure is being served delicacies, and is surrounded by other oriental figures, a pair to the left playing musical instruments. Below her stands a giant leafy pot-plant, and a quiver of arrows lies in the lower right corner. Food, music and flamboyant flora, mixed with decorative and architectural ornaments, orchestrated in a playful and refined ensemble, is a most appropriate combination of elements for an elegant interior.

See also the following two lots.

1. Paris, Ecole des Beaux-Arts, inv. no. MAS. 2540; the design on the reverse also representing Africa, but with a different, unrelated composition

2. J. Tonkovich, 'New light on Drawings by Claude Gillot and His Circle in Stockholm', Master Drawings, vol. 47, no. 2, 2009), p. 169, reproduced fig. 13

3. Stockholm, Nationalmuseum, inv nos. NM Anck. 231, 232; Berlin, Kunstbibliothek inv. nos. HdZ 2469/68, 69, 85, 86 and 93. Tonkovich, op. cit., pp. 161-166, reproduced figs. 2 (a-b), 3 (a-b), 4-8