{"id":1408,"date":"2022-01-23T13:59:24","date_gmt":"2022-01-23T05:59:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.atelierauction.com\/globalupdates\/?p=1408"},"modified":"2022-01-23T14:05:13","modified_gmt":"2022-01-23T06:05:13","slug":"met-museum-receives-rare-poussin-painting-from-top-collectors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.atelierauction.com\/globalupdates\/artist\/met-museum-receives-rare-poussin-painting-from-top-collectors\/","title":{"rendered":"Met Museum Receives Rare Poussin Painting from Top Collectors"},"content":{"rendered":"

Passed down, bought, and sold over the centuries, a glitzy collector\u2019s item from the 17th century has finally entered a museum collection. The\u00a0Metropolitan Museum of Art<\/a>\u00a0in New York has received\u00a0Nicolas Poussin<\/a>\u2019s\u00a0Agony in the Garden\u00a0<\/em>(1626\u201327), courtesy of New York collectors Barbara and\u00a0Jon Landau, who have been listed on\u00a0ARTnews<\/em>\u2019s\u00a0Top 200 Collectors list<\/a>\u00a0each year since 1995.<\/p>\n

The Met already owns six Poussin paintings, including\u00a0Midas Washing at the Source of the Pactolus<\/em>\u00a0(ca. 1627), which was part of the original seed purchase that established the museum in 1871. Now, it has seven paintings by the artist with the addition of\u00a0Agony in the Garden<\/em>, which goes on view today.<\/p>\n

The Landaus have owned\u00a0Agony in the Garden\u00a0<\/em>for the past 22 years, and it has held pride of place ever since in the \u201ccenter hall gallery with four of our greatest masterpieces,\u201d Jon said in an email. They most recently lent the work to the Louvre\u2019s 2015 exhibition \u201cPoussin and God.\u201d He continued, \u201cThe Met already had the largest group of Poussins in North America, and our picture truly adds to and enhances its collection of the artist.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPoussin is this titan of European art, even though he\u2019s not necessarily, for some people, a household name,\u201d said David Pullins, an associate curator in the Met\u2019s department of European painting. \u201cOne of the reasons that he\u2019s so important is that he\u2019s crucial in the color-versus-line debate that will dominate European art making and art theory for centuries.\u201d<\/p>\n

This work is particularly unusual within Poussin\u2019s oeuvre, as it is one of only two accepted works by the artist of oil on copper (as opposed to oil on canvas). Measuring just over 24 inches by 19 inches, and just one millimeter thick,\u00a0Agony in the Garden\u00a0<\/em>was made shortly after the French painter arrived in Rome in 1624. There, he studied Italian Renaissance painting and new archaeological discoveries of Greco-Roman antiquities.<\/p>\n

At the time, Poussin was largely unknown, since he had only just started to make the connections needed to secure a major following. He needed something to call attention to himself, so he bought a large sheet of copper, which at the time would have been an expensive material for a young artist. Typically, copper would have been used to make an etching, and because one could run prints using the copper as a plate, that would help an artist recoup the cost shelled out for a sheet of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis medium of oil on copper in 17th-century Europe was always understood as really a collector\u2019s item, a luxury object\u2014it upped the ante,\u201d Pullins said. \u201cIt\u2019s a glitzy object from the start, calling attention to itself. It would have been kind of thing that a collector would have kept like a smaller cabinet space that was really meant for close looking, and so naturally, it rewards that kind of close looking.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"A<\/div>\n<\/div>
Nicolas Poussin,\u00a0Agony in the Garden<\/em>\u00a0(verso), ca. 1626\u201327.<\/span>THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART, GIFT OF JON AND\u00a0BARBARA LANDAU<\/a>\u00a0IN HONOR OF KEITH CHRISTIANSEN<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

On the verso of the painting is a Latin inscription, \u201cSALVATORIS IN HORTO GETSEMA \/ NI A NICOLAO POVSSIN COLORIBVS \/ EXPRESSA<\/small>,\u201d that is consistent with how the work would have been inventoried upon entering the collection Carlo Antonio dal Pozzo, the brother of Cassiano dal Pozzo, who would eventually become Poussin\u2019s greatest patron in Rome.<\/p>\n

Agony in the Garden\u00a0<\/em>depicts the New Testament scene in which Jesus, after the Last Supper, goes with Saints Peter, James, and John to the garden of Gethsemane. His apostles promptly fall asleep, as shown in the foreground, while Jesus prays to God the Father, asking if he might be spared from his coming death and later for strength in what is to come. In response, a flood of angels descends to Earth bringing forth the cross that Jesus will carry and then be crucified to the following day. To this composition Poussin adds a blocky stone architectural structure that has yet to be identified but could possibly refer to the founding of the Church upon Jesus\u2019s death. The scene is mostly done in a reddish ochre palette that is accented with pops of color in the clothes of the figures.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s wonderful in this work is that you still see Poussin working out his own thoughts on the color-versus-line debate,\u201d Pullin said. \u201cThere\u2019s still a real legacy of Venetian painting in the light and handling in certain parts, but then there are these heavy sculptural, classical references with the figures in the foreground and the architecture and the background. He\u2019s still sorting it out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Landau called Poussin a \u201cdivine artist,\u201d adding, \u201cThe emotional and artistic underpinnings of religious paintings are what counts. When done with brilliance,\u00a0religious paintings can affect us all.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Landaus began collecting<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0in the 1970s, starting out with American modernists, including Arthur Dove, Milton Avery, Stuart Davis, and Marsden Hartley. In the \u201980s, they expanded their interests to pre-Impressionist French artists like Courbet, Corot, Delacroix, and Millet, and in the \u201990s, they finally came to Old Master paintings and Renaissance sculpture.<\/p>\n

Around this time, the Landaus befriended George Goldner, a curator at the Met. Over the course of the years, Goldner \u201casked me one day if I was interested in seeing the most beautiful painting for sale in New York City,\u201d Jon recalled. Together they went to the famed Wildenstein & Co. gallery in New York, where they laid eyes on Poussin\u2019s\u00a0The Agony in the Garden<\/em>. \u201cWe thought it one of the most beautiful paintings we had ever seen and soon made arrangements to acquire it,\u201d Jon added.<\/p>\n

Though the Landaus at one point owned two works by Poussin, they eventually parted ways with the other work and have since doubled down on their commitment to purchasing Renaissance sculpture. Poussin\u2019s\u00a0Agony in the Garden<\/em>, a work of Baroque art, \u201cbecame an outlier in the collection,\u201d Jon said.<\/p>\n

As with most top collectors, the Landaus have had an ongoing relationship with the Met for decades, having lent pieces from their collection to the museum over the years, served on committees, and promised another work, Th\u00e9odore Rousseau\u2019s\u00a0Hamlet in the Auvergne<\/em>\u00a0(1830), in 2020. \u201cThe Metropolitan has been our most important teacher of all,\u201d Jon said. \u201cCountless staff members have reached out to us in every way to increase our knowledge and experience of great art.\u201d<\/p>\n

Among them is Keith Christiansen, the former chairmen of the Met\u2019s department of European painting, in whose honor the Landaus donated the work. \u201cKeith Christiansen<\/a>, taught us more than anyone else about art,\u201d Jon said. \u201cWe consider the Met to be our second home and the greatest artistic institution in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pullins added, \u201cAs a curator, you don\u2019t really expect to get a knock on the door with adding a Poussin\u2014it\u2019s a pretty big deal.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Source: https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Passed down, bought, and sold over the centuries, a glitzy collector\u2019s item from the 17th century has finally entered a museum collection. The\u00a0Metropolitan Museum of Art\u00a0in New York has received\u00a0Nicolas Poussin\u2019s\u00a0Agony in the Garden\u00a0(1626\u201327), courtesy of New York collectors Barbara and\u00a0Jon Landau, who have been listed on\u00a0ARTnews\u2019s\u00a0Top 200 Collectors list\u00a0each year since 1995. The Met […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1409,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5,13,7,4,3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1408","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artist","8":"category-auction","9":"category-events","10":"category-gallery","11":"category-latest-news"},"yoast_head":"\nMet Museum Receives Rare Poussin Painting from Top Collectors - Investable Art Auctioneer<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Passed down, bought, and sold over the centuries, a glitzy collector\u2019s item from the 17th century has finally entered a museum collection.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.atelierauction.com\/globalupdates\/artist\/met-museum-receives-rare-poussin-painting-from-top-collectors\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Met Museum Receives Rare Poussin Painting from Top Collectors - 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