antique engraving “Laocoon”, artist’s study from “The Proportions of the Human Body”
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This engraving would have originally appeared in a copy of Gérard Audran’s book “The Proportions of the Human Body”. Printed in 1683, it reveals the ongoing reverence for classical sculpture, which competed with live models for the attention of art students. While working with a live model allowed an endless variety of poses, famous statues like the Apollo Belvedere, the Laocoön, and the Medici Venus offered examples of bodily perfection deemed worthy of admiration by centuries of artists and aesthetes. Audran traveled to Italy and visited the Vatican and Capitoline Museums in Rome, creating this book to make those collections more accessible to other artists and students. In each case, he provided engraved views of the work from several angles, allowing readers to “turn” the model and study its measurements from all sides.
NOTES:
Gerard Audran was the youngest son of the engraver Claude Audran (1597-1675) and his wife Hélie. He owed his artistic and financial breakthrough to his patron Jean-Baptiste Colbert, among others. 1666-1669 Audran undertook a study trip through Italy. In Rome he became the pupil of Carlo Maratta. Audran engraved numerous sheets after Raphael, Titian, Annibale Carracci, Domenichino, Nicolas Poussin, Pierre Mignard, which are characterized by a rare skill and painterly effect of treatment. He was an engraver in the grand historical style and worked on copper plates that were unusually large for his time. At the request of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Audran returned to France. Charles Le Brun quickly recognized the young man's talent and urged the Prime Minister to ensure that he should keep Audran in France permanently. Colbert provided him with lodgings at the Gobelins and appointed him the king's ordinary engraver. He also entrusted him with the task of stabbing the battles of Alexander that Charles Le Brun had just finished. Audran initially had an apartment in the "Gobelins" and later settled in the rue St. Jacques, where he ran a shop. Louis XIV appointed him court engraver. As such, he was elected Conseiller en l'Académie de peinture et de sculpture on November 21, 1681, and Audran became a member of the Académie Royale.
dimensions: 19.5"W x 23"H x 1.5"D
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