Lot 193: Jean-Simon Berthélemy (Laon 1743-1811 Paris)

Jean-Simon Berthélemy (Laon 1743-1811 Paris)
Jupiter and Antiope
signed and dated 'Berthelemyυ. 1778υ.' (lower left)
oil on canvas
30 5/8 x 38 in. (77.8 x 96.5 cm.)

M. Sandoz, Jean-Simon Berthélemy, 1743-1811, avec des remarques liminaires..., Paris, 1979, p. 98, no. 54, as location unknown.
N. Volle, Jean-Simon Berthélemy, 1743-1811: peintre d'histoire, Paris, 1979, p. 82, no. 50 and under no. 48, as location unknown.

Louis-Gabriel, marquis de Véri (1722-1785); (+), Paris, hôtel de Bullion, 12 December 1785, lot 47, as a pair to a Bacchante etendue jouant des cymbales, 'Ces deux morceaux, agréblement composés, sont parfaitement rendus; ils offrent à la fois le charme d'un dessin pur, élégant et correct et celui d'une couleur brillante et fraîche comme la nature' (1,400 livres to 'Le brun l'aîné').
Anonymous sale; Tajan, Paris, 9 April 1991, lot 41.

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The pendant to the present lot remains untraced, but is known from a reduced version (oil on canvas, 63.5 x 78.5 cm., signed and dated 1778), which was at Sotheby's, New York, 12 January 1989, no. 156 (see Volle, op. cit., no. 47). Jean-Pierre Cuzin has also published a sketch by Barthelémy for the pendant, formerly attributed to Fragonard (J.P. Cuzin, Fragonard: Vie et oeuvre, Paris, 1987, p. 11, fig. 14).