Claude, the Elder Vignon
(1593 - 1670) |
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Secular Narratives, Historic Narratives, Mythological Narratives Art Work
| Name: |
Claude, the Elder Vignon |
| Gender: |
Male |
| Place of Birth: |
Tours |
| Nationality: |
French |
| Birth: |
1593 |
| Death: |
1670 |
| Website: |
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| Past Auctions: |
Click Here |
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Quick Facts
| Known For: |
Secular Narratives, Historic Narratives, Mythological Narratives |
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| Fine Art Profession(s): |
Painting
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Biography
| Considered one of the most important painters active in Paris before the arrival of Vouet in 1627, Claude Vignon is also one of the most interesting and colorful. He traveled extensively (to Italy and Spain), was prolific and successful professionally (his oeuvre is vast) and also personally (between two wives he had thirty-four children). Though he could have retained an orientation to mannerism, Vignon was as diverse in his tastes as he was prolific in his own work. He knew and admired Rembrandt and shared with him an interest in rich paint and a sympathetic, realistic interpretation of humanity. At other times Vignon was looking at artists as different as Rubens and Caravaggio. Vignon skillfully wove his many sources into what has been termed the first truly baroque style in France. After studying with Lallemant, Jacob Bunel, and Martin Freminet, Vignon was established as an independent master and joined the St. Luke's Guild in 1616. Shortly thereafter he traveled to Italy, arriving in Rome by 1617 (which is known from his Martyrdom of St. Matthew, signed and dated 1617, Arras, Palais Saint-Vaast). Vignon toured Italy with Simon Vouet and was in Venice around 1620. Between 1621 and 1623, Vignon won a competition sponsored by Prince Ludovisi with his Marriage at Cana (formerly Berlin, destroyed in World War II). In Rome, Vignon knew the Italian Caravaggisti, the followers of Adam Elsheimer, notably C. van Poelenburgh, Leonard Bramer, and Genii von Honthorst. He also looked at many other Italian masters including Domenico Fetti, Palma Vecchio, and Luca Giordano. Vignon made two trips to Spain, where he responded to the works of Valdes Leal and Murillo. Scholars also make much of the fact that Vignon knew Rembrandt and was one of his earliest French supporters, sharing with Rembrandt an interest in Lastman. Vignon returned to Paris in 1623 to sign a marriage contract with his first wife. His work Christ among the Doctors (signed, Grenoble, Musee de Peinture et de Sculpture) dates from that year and demonstrates his adaptation of various sources, including Castiglione. Vignon is also recorded back in Rome that year, prompting some scholars to suggest that his Grenoble painting was produced in Italy. Vignon returned to Paris for a longer stay, probably in 1624-27, and began to fulfill the numerous demands for his decorations in noble houses (most of which are now lost). Louis XIII and Cardinal Richelieu rank among his important patrons, and from this time on Vignon's output was increasingly prolific and diverse. Secular, sacred, and historical subjects poured from his studio as well as genre subjects, allegories, mythologies, and portraits. Vignon's portraits, such as that of Francois Langlois as a Bagpipe Player (Wellesley, MA, Wellesley College Museum), show his adaptation of Dutch Caravaggism, Frans Hals,* and Haarlem genre painters into a mode which, though betraying its sources, is vividly original. Vignon's rich impasto manner of painting, his habit of setting boldly dynamic figures against dark ground in a virtuoso display of draftsmanship and painting (such as in Sf. Ambrose, signed and dated 1623, Minneapolis Institute of Art), anticipates, as does his portraiture, eighteenth-century masters such as Fragonard. On the other hand, Vignon's Death of a Hermit (Paris, Louvre), which is dated to sometime after 1620, harks back to such early mannerists like Procaccini. Like Pieter Lastman, Vignon searched for an alternative to the more rigid classicism of other painters. In 1651 Vignon was admitted into the Royal Academy, and by that time his style was apparently out of date. Nevertheless, Vignon continued to remain productive. From 1659 to 1661 we know he was active as a picture dealer, selling among other pictures those by Rembrandt. |
Samples of Work
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