Lot 59: Jean-Victor-Louis Faure (Berlin 1786-1879 Paris)

Jean-Victor-Louis Faure (Berlin 1786-1879 Paris)
The Pantheon, Rome
signed and inscribed 'J Faure/Roma' (lower centre)
oil on canvas
48 X 57 in. (122 x 145 cm.)

Sir Everard Scarsbrick, Scarsbrick Hall, Scarsbrick until 1949.
Anonymous sale; Sotheby's, London, 15 March 1989, lot 73.

THE PROPERTY OF A GENTLEMAN (LOTS..................
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Faure was born in Berlin at the end of the 18th century to French parents. Little information exists on the artist's whereabouts during his formative years, however once he had settled in Paris, he became a student of the famed historical landscape painter, Jean-Victor Bertin, whose extensive oeuvre is dominated by views of the Italian landscape. His depiction of the landscape and his treatment of light had a strong influence on all his students, including Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot and Charles-François Daubigny.

Faure was one of many northern artists who made the journey to Italy to observe the beauty of landscape and light in order to develop their art, painting directly from nature. In the present lot Faure's style shows the influence on his work by the principle exponents of the local contemporary artistic culture in Rome such as Ippolito Caffi. Inspired by 18th century urban landscape painter or vedutista Bernardo Bellotto (and his uncle Canaletto), Caffi modernized the veduta selecting new points of view and the effects of light and atmosphere at particular times.

The present lot depicts a view of the Pantheon in Rome. Originally built as a temple to all the gods of Ancient Rome, it has been a Roman Catholic church since the 7th century. As the best-preserved example of an Ancient Roman monumental building, the Pantheon has been enormously influential in Western Architecture from the Renaissance until well into the 20th Century.