Attributed to Lucas Faydherbe (1617-1697), Southern Netherlandish, second quarter of the 17th century

Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, 18 May 1993, lot 83 (408 000 FB) ;

Acquired in this sale, Belgian noble collection.

This relief, which is exceptionally well executed, can be compared to a small group of ivory works attributed, with varying degrees of certainty, to Lucas Faydherbe. The reference model in this group, on which the attribution to the Malines sculptor is based, is a relief with Children Dancing around the God Pan, monogrammed LF and corresponding to the description of one of the ivories inventoried in Rubens' collections at the time of his death (Prado Museum, Madrid, inv. E000257). A terracotta version of the same model is in the Royal Museums of Art and History, Brussels (inv. R. 1). From 1636 to 1640, Faydherbe was in Antwerp, working in Rubens' important workshop, where he was involved in the production of ivories based on the master's compositions. Thus, the relief in the Prado, which dates from Faydherbe's activity in Antwerp, is freely inspired by the Feast of Venus in the Kunsthistorisches Museum (inv. 684).

Rubens does not seem to be the inventor of the present composition, but he did treat the theme of the young Suzanne surprised naked in her bath on several occasions. Examples include the painting in the Borghese Gallery (c. 1622; inv. 277), the one in the Prado Museum (c. 1610; inv. 0688), the one in the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm (c. 1614; inv. NM 603), and the one in the Alte Pinakothek in Munich (c. 1636-38; inv. 317). It should also be noted that the Prado and Stockholm versions feature a dolphin-shaped fountain very similar to the one on the left of our composition. Finally, the Munich painting has a classical architectural background similar to the background of our relief.

Although the former attribution of some of these ivories to Fayhderbe has now been rejected, notably for the Leda and the Swan in the Louvre Museum (inv. TH 161), it has been reinstated for others, including the Venus Pudica in the Fitzwilliam Museum (inv. M.410-1985). In fact, the similarities between the present relief and the one in the Prado are worth noting. The considerable depth of our composition, with a foreground in high relief, notably with the heads of Susanna and one of the old men, which stand out almost in the round, and a background where the façade of a palace is barely visible, treated in the manner of Renaissance schiacciato, is comparable to the Prado example. Similarly, in both reliefs we find excellent anatomical mastery, a subtle interplay of beautifully rendered hands, a few fine curls emerging from the hair, and a perfect integration of the figures into the space, which is more comparable to large statuary than to small ivory pieces.

RELATED LITERATURE

P. Malgouyres, Ivoires de la Renaissance et des Temps modernes. La collection du musée du Louvre, Paris, 2010, pp. 58-59, no. 29;

La sculpture au siècle de Rubens dans les Pays-Bas méridionaux et la principauté de Liège, exh. cat. Musée d’Art Ancien, Brussels, 1977, pp. 99-101, no. 63 & 64.