Jean Valette-Falgores, called Penot

Roberto Polo (b. 1951), New York;

By whom sold ("Property from a Collection formed by Roberto Polo sold at the Direction of the Internal Revenue Service"), New York, Sotheby's, 11 January 1990, lot 95;

Where acquired by a private collector, London;

By whom anonymously sold, New York, Sotheby's, 21 May 1998, lot 124;

Where acquired by Jordan and Thomas A. Saunders III.

Richmond, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Elegance and Wonder: Masterpieces of European Art from the Jordan and Thomas A. Saunders III Collection, 20 March 2023 - 30 January 2025, no. 22.

M. Harrington, in With Observation and Imagination: Still Lifes, Genre Scenes, Portraits, and Landscapes from the Saunders Collection, exhibition catalogue, A.K. Wheelock, Jr. (ed.), New York 2021, pp. 99-101, 173, cat. no. 22, reproduced.

Jean Valette-Falgores, called Penot, was a French artist of the eighteenth century best known for his trompe l’œil still lifes, which were intended to “trick the eye” of the viewer into thinking the image was a three-dimensional object. Here, Valette-Penot has depicted a letter board with numerous objects including a print by Antonio Tempesta, crumpled delicately and pinned beneath a pair of spectacles; a quill and penknife, held beneath a thin, twisting pink ribbon that snakes across the composition; bits of a Queen of Hearts playing card pinned in various places; a copy of Nostradamus; and an unsealed letter next to a bar of red sealing wax. At center is a Venus shell, hanging delicately from a blue ribbon.

The overall effect of the seemingly random arrangement turns out to be a rather harmonious composition, particularly as the colorful ribbons encourage the viewer's eye to move throughout the objects. The shadows and varying textures play off the various forms of light in a playful and interesting manner. Valette-Penot's use of light is particularly interesting in the reflection through the spectacles, as the bright sun reflects off of the print beneath it to distort the shadows of the rims.

Little is known about the early history of this painting, though the objects mostly relate to literary and artistic themes, perhaps signaling the interests of the patron (who, given the address of the letter, likely lived in Paris) and establishing he or she as an intellectual, interested in history, the arts, religion, and perhaps the natural world, given the shell's central location.

Originally popularized by seventeenth-century Dutch artists, such as Samuel van Hoogstraten and Cornelius Gijsbrechts, the tradition of trompe-l'œil letter board painting became fashionable in the eighteenth century mostly outside of Paris. Louis-Leopold Boilly was one of its most popular proponents in France. Valette-Penot originally studied as a still life specialist in Toulouse and then traveled to Rome and Paris, but ultimately settled back in his native Montauban where he taught drawing and founded a tapestry manufactory.