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Study of a frame decorating a painting by Andrea Pozzo in the church of Saint Ignatius, Rome

Maker

(artist)
1730-1809

Title

Date of Production

1752 - 1755

Medium

black chalk on white laid paper, now laid down on Japanese tissue

Dimensions

Height: 23.7 cm
Width: 18.7 cm

Accession Number

D.1952.RW.4145

Mode of Acquisition

Robert Clermont Witt, bequest, 1952

Credit

The Courtauld, London (Samuel Courtauld Trust)

Copyright

Work in the public domain

Location

Not currently on display

Keywords

Label Text

Executed when the sculptor Pajou was a student in Rome, this study focuses on the frame; the altarpiece is evoked by words and a few, rough squiggles. Pajou’s copy appears to have been made level with the frame’s upper rail. It records the shell’s rupture of the pediment, a break masked in situ, where the frame is seen from below. Not only is the study attentive to shape – to the C-scrolls that sit in the depressed corners of the frame – it attends also to qualities of relief: to the swell of the mouldings, the projection of the clasp and the detachment of the garlands that cast shadows across the painting’s surface. This extreme focus on ornament, unusual in Pajou’s Roman drawings, is perhaps accounted for by his participation in the decoration of San Luigi dei Francesi in 1754. Scholars have noted a resemblance between the Pozzo frame and the gigantic stucco shell clasps that stud the gilded frame around Charles Natoire’s ceiling fresco in the nave.

Provenance

Oswald Magniac; his sale, Christie's (London), 25 March 1949, lot 63 (with eight others); purchased there by Colnaghi (London); purchased there by Sir Robert Witt, London (1872-1952), L.2228b (£6 for all nine drawings); Witt Bequest 1952

Exhibition History

Drawings Gallery Display - Ornament by Design, The Courtauld Gallery, London, 23/04/2016-12/06/2016

Architectural Drawings from the Witt Collection, The Courtauld Gallery, London, 01/07/1961-01/10/1961

Literature

Augustin Pajou dessinateur en Italie 1752-1756, Musée du Louvre, Paris Nogent-le-Roi 1997, Archives de l'art francais, Nouvelle periode, Tome XXXIII
p. 10
fig. 2 on p.10

Architectural Drawings from the Witt Collection, Courtauld Gallery, London, 1961
cat. no. 31

Inscriptions

Watermark: Watermark: centre: circle containing an anchor, above is a six-pointed star, below is the letter “E” or "F" (not found in Heawood or Piccard, see tracing in file).

Inscription: Recto: within the drawing, brown ink: “cet bordure est dorée de se / trouve dans le college Romain / a la grande autelle du autour untablau / da Padre pozie. [sic] //”.

Collector's mark: Verso: lower left corner, stamped in black ink: Sir Robert Witt (L.2228b).

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