Musée du Louvre and Teylers Museum Present Exhibitions of Claude Lorrain

Written by Bernard Rendumier Friday, 08 July 2011 22:50

PARIS, FRANCE - Teylers Museum and Musée du Louvre present the first comprehensive exhibition in the Netherlands on Claude Lorrain, master of the golden light.  This autumn, Teylers Museum and Musée du Louvre present the first comprehensive exhibition on Claude Lorrain (1600 - 1682) ever held in the Netherlands. This French landscape painter is one of the most important masters in the history of art. An overview of his life's work, featuring over 100 works of art, will be shown in Haarlem and Paris. The exhibition will be on display at the Louvre from 20 April to 18 July 2011 and at Teylers museum from 28 September 2011 to 8 January 2012.

Claude Lorrain
This 17th century painter, drawer and etcher is one of the greatest landscape artists ever. He celebrated his triumphs in Rome, where the entire European upper class commissioned work from him. Lorrain's invention, the first paintings of ideal landscapes bathed in a golden light, remained the standard for other famous artists until the late 19th century. His style has been copied so often - frequently by less talented artists - to the point that the inventor himself has ended up in the background to a certain extent. There are only two paintings by Lorrain in the Netherlands, while in other European countries the permanent collections of the most important national museums include many of his works. The Netherlands is one of the few places not to have held a major Claude Lorrain exhibition, but Teylers Museum and the Louvre are changing that with this joint project.

In 1627 Claude was in Rome. Here, two landscapes made for Cardinal Bentivoglio earned him the patronage of Pope Urban VIII. From about 1637 he rapidly achieved fame as a painter of landscapes and seascapes. He apparently befriended his fellow Frenchman Nicolas Poussin; together they would travel the Roman Campagna, sketching landscapes. Though both have been called landscape painters, in Poussin the landscape is a background to the figures; whereas for Claude, despite figures in one corner of the canvas, the true subjects are the land, the sea, and the air. By report, he often engaged other artists to paint the figures for him, including Courtois and Filippo Lauri. He remarked to those purchasing his pictures that he sold them the landscape; the figures were gratis.

Key works of art from all over the world
Teylers Museum and the Louvre are combining their collections of drawings and prints by Lorrain for this exhibition. Key paintings by Lorrain, from the United States and many European countries, have been added to illustrate the importance of the drawings in the context of his life's work. All in all, some 80 drawings, 20 etchings and 14 paintings will be on display. The National Galleries of Scotland have given special permission for Lorrain's largest and most ambitious painting - Landscape with Apollo and the Muses (1652) - to travel to Haarlem for this occasion. The exhibition illustrates how much Lorrain owes to the Dutch masters who were living and working in Rome at the beginning of his career.




Prologue: Rineke Dijkstra
As a prelude to the major Lorrain exhibition, from 22 April to 18 September 2011, the Print Gallery of Teylers Museum will show the link between Lorrain's work and contemporary art. Drawings by the French master are displayed next to photographs from the Park Portraits series by the famous Dutch visual artist Rineke Dijkstra. This unusual combination illustrates how artists of every era struggle with depicting the ideal landscape.

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