Lot 126: Nicolas Fouche

Nicolas Fouche
Troyes 1653 - 1733 Paris
portrait of a lady as flora, three-quarter length, accompanied by zephyr
oil on canvas, in a carved and gilt wood frame
87.5 by 68 cm.; 34.5 by 26 3/4 in.
Nicolas Fouche was a successful artist in his own day and it is somewhat surprising that we not only have very scant biographical material but also that we know of so few paintings by him today. He worked in Paris, becoming a member of the Academie de Saint-Luc on 15 March 1679. As was reported in the Abbe de Monville's account of 1730 of the Life of Fouche's master, Pierre Mignard, the latter 'n'a forme depuis [son retour d'Italie] que Nicolas Fouche qui vit encore, et qui a de la reputation'.
Many of Fouche's paintings are either lost or exist under alternative attributions, and a series of mythological scenes are only known today through Desplaces' engravings (see D. Wildenstein, 'Nicolas Fouche. Peintre de l'Academie de Saint-Luc', in Gazette des Beaux-Arts, November 1964, pp. 311-3, reproduced figs. 1-13); though one of these - Pomona - has since been identified with a painting now in Budapest.
Provenance:
Private collection, near Saint-Etienne, by the end of the 18th Century;
Thence by descent to the present owner.