Architectural Engravings by Antoine Le Pautre & Views of The Roman Campagna by Jan Asselijn

ARCHITECTURE. LePautre, Antoine (1621-1679); Perelle, Gabriel (1603-1677); Asselijn, Jan (ca. 1610-1652)

Plans et Elevations du Corps de L'Eglize du Port Royal [and other series]

Paris: No printer stated, 1652.

Price: $12,000.00

Large folio: 47.5 x 34.9 cm. Five leaves with five unnumbered etched plates of plans for the Port-Royal Abbey in Paris.

A superb album OF NINETY-ONE PLATES IN RICH EARLY IMPRESSIONS presents the work of three French and one Dutch artists, including the Parisian architect Antoine Le Pautre’s ideal and realized designs for exteriors and interiors at the height of the French Baroque. All eight suites are in excellent condition. Bound in contemporary vellum over stiff boards, four green ties.

The first two suites (fifty-eight plates) are essentially the complete works of Le Pautre. All in first state, these impressions appeared prior to his 1652 privilege and title leaf. The plates are notable for their dramatic handling of space and their sculptural approach to mass.

“Le Pautre, son of a master woodworker, was trained as an engraver by his brother Jean. He chose architecture as his profession, and advanced rapidly. By the age of twenty-two he was titled ‘mason and architect,’ and in the following year received the title of ‘architect of the king's buildings.’ He is responsible for several major buildings in Paris and is the chief representative of the baroque episode in French architecture, which was based on Italian models. He became one of the founding members of the Academie Royale d'Architecture when it was established in 1671.

“The examples contained in Le Pautre's Oeuvres are evenly divided between four built works, including his important designs for the Chapelle de Porte-Royale and the Hotel de Beauvais [and Hôtel de Fontenay-Mareuil], all designed and engraved by Le Pautre; and four projects consisting of highly imaginative fantasies on country houses, for which the ultimate source appears to be the third book of Jacques Androuet du Cerceau's ‘Livres d'architecture’.

“The unbuilt projects on country houses had considerable impact on the designs of later architects. Bernini was influenced by the fourth project in his first design for the east front of the Louvre, and both the second and fourth designs would be adapted for projects by such major eighteenth century architects as Germain Boffrand.”(Millard)

¶Préaud, Graveurs du XVIIe Siècle: Antoine, Jacques, et Jean Lepautre 14-34: 3-5, 7-58, 60-61; Berger, Antoine Le Pautre passim; see Weibenson & Baines, The Mark Millard Architectural Collection French Books 96.

ADDITIONAL SERIES OF PLATES:

Bound with Le Pautre’s plates are Gabriel Perelle's highly romantic and tranquil Italianate landscapes and ruins. Eighteen of the plates comprise the desirable "Views of the Ruins of Rome and Environs", a collaboration with the Dutch painter Jan Asselijn, “a prominent landscape painter and draftsman in the Dutch Italianate tradition. In Rome, Asselijn became a member of the Bentvueghels (Dutch for “Birds of a Feather”), an association of northern artists who painted views of the sun-drenched Roman countryside, as well as picturesque scenes of everyday urban life.”(Metropolitan Museum of Art) Asselijn’s celebrated painting “De bedreigde zwaan” (“The Threatened Swan”) hangs prominently in Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum.

“Gabriel Perelle was the son of a farmer for the Duke de La Vienville, who noticed his taste for design and sponsored lessons for him with the painter Daniel Rabel. Perelle continued his studies in Paris, where he worked in the atelier of the eminent French painter Simon Vouet. Perelle developed his talent uniquely in the arts of design and engraving and in painting in the landscape genre…

“Where Perelle's paintings were inspired by the designs of Claude Lorrain and Francisque Millet, his designs for his engraved views are close in spirit to those of Israel Silvestre… Perelle produced his views in the traditional format of the oblong illustrations of Jean Marot: they belong to the growing number of views produced for the public, rather than for royal patronage.”(Millard)

¶For suites III-V, see Hollstein, Dutch & Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts 1450-1700 I: 44.

The final two plates are from Jean Marot's Ceiling Sections. ¶See Mauban, Jean Marot: Architecte et graveur Parisien 176-177.

FULL CONTENTS:
LE PAUTRE, Antoine. 1621-1679.
Five leaves with five unnumbered etched plates of plans for the Port-Royal Abbey in Paris.
Bound with: LE PAUTRE, Antoine. 1621-1679.
 [Desseins de plusieurs plans d'eglises, pallais et chasteaux]. Paris, s.n. before 1652. Large folio. Forty-nine leaves with fifty-two unnumbered etched plates.

Bound with: PERELLE, Gabriel. 1603-1677.
 [Views of the ruins of Rome and environs]. Paris, P. Mariette [1646]. Large folio. Six leaves with six numbered etched plates (Perelle after Dutch painter Jan Asselijn). 

Bound with: PERELLE, Gabriel. 1603-1677.
 [Views of the ruins of Rome and environs]. Paris, P. Mariette c. 1646. Large folio. Six leaves with six numbered etched plates (Perelle after Asselijn).

Bound with: PERELLE, Gabriel. 1603-1677.
 [Views of the ruins of Rome and environs]. Paris, P. Mariette c. 1646. Large folio. Six leaves with six numbered etched plates (Perelle after Asselijn). 

Bound with: PERELLE, Gabriel. 1603-1677.
 [Etchings of landscapes and classical ruins]. Paris, J. I Le Blond c. 1650. Large folio. Ten leaves with ten unnumbered etched plates. 

Bound with: PERELLE, Gabriel. 1603-1677.
 [Etchings of landscapes and classical ruins]. Paris, J. I Le Blond c. 1650. Large folio. Four leaves with four unnumbered etched plates. 

Bound with: MAROT, Jean. c.1619-1679.
 [Planches des quarts de plafonds]. [Paris], s.n. c. 1650. Large folio. Two leaves, each an etched ceiling design.