Claude Gellée, called Claude Lorrain

Private collection, England, by 1979;

With Rafael Valls Gallery, London, by 1983.

Munich, Haus der Kunst, Im Licht von Claude Lorrain. Landschaftsmalerei aus drei Jahrhunderten, 12 March – 29 May 1983, no. 3.

M. Roethlisberger, 'Additional Works by Goffredo Wals and Claude Lorrain', in The Burlington Magazine, vol. 121, 910, January 1979, p. 24, reproduced fig. 33;

M. Roethlisberger, Im Licht von Claude Lorrain. Landschaftsmalerei aus drei Jahrhunderten, exh. cat., Munich 1983, pp. 66–67, no. 3, reproduced;

The beautifully evocative depiction of the Italian campagna was previously unknown to scholars before its emergence from a private English country-house collection in 1979. At that time, it was recognised by Marcel Roethlisberger as an autograph work by Claude Lorrain, and as a significant addition to the artist’s œuvre, which he dated to circa 1632–33.

The scene depicts an expansive pastoral landscape bathed in the golden light of the setting sun, partially obscured by the trees at left. The foreground is populated by a multitude of figures gathered beneath tall, leafy trees, some seated in conversation while others, most notably the two protagonists of the composition, are engaged in a rural dance. Beyond them, herds of grazing animals spread across gently rolling hills that recede into a luminous, softly lit distance.

The rural dance is the only fully developed subject that recurs throughout Claude’s production of the 1630s, spanning paintings, drawings, and etchings. The earliest treatment of this theme is likely the canvas in the Saint Louis Art Museum, Missouri, dated by Roethlisberger to the early 1630s.¹ The present work compares more closely, particularly in the execution of the figures, to a smaller canvas in the Gallerie degli Uffizi, Florence,² and to a variant of approximately the same size formerly in the collection of the Duke of Westminster sold in December 2010 for £2,057,250.³ Both works postdate the present painting, which, according to Roethlisberger, may have served as the model for their figure groups.

This painting and its variants predate the artist’s Liber Veritatis; however, Claude’s etching Landscape with a Country Dance,⁴ known in several states, is closely related to the present work. The etching repeats the central motif of dancing peasants within a similarly expansive pastoral setting, underscoring the importance of the subject in Claude’s artistic imagination during this formative period of his career.

¹ https://www.slam.org/collection/objects/36241/

² https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lorrain_uffizi.jpg

³ https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-5391288

⁴ https://www.clevelandart.org/print/art/1939.588