Jean Petitot and Workshop, Portrait of King Louis XIV, ca. 1680

Chicago:

Blythe Sobol, “Jean Petitot and Workshop, Portrait of King Louis XIV, ca. 1680,” catalogue entry in Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan, The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, vol. 1, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2024), https://doi.org/10.37764/8322.5.2108.

MLA:

Sobol, Blythe. “Jean Petitot and Workshop, Portrait of King Louis XIV, ca. 1680,” catalogue entry. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan. The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, vol. 1, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2024. doi: 10.37764/8322.5.2108.

See the artist’s biography in volume 4.

By the 1670s, the enamellist Jean Petitot and his workshop were occupied almost entirely by the large-scale manufacture of tiny portraits of King Louis XIV of France (1638–1715), intended as diplomatic gifts and tokens for courtiers. The existence of this enamel miniature, and many similar examples, is a testament to the Petitot workshop’s prolific production. Such images were one facet of a decades-long campaign by the monarch to craft his image and strengthen the French monarchy after the depredations of a civil war, called The Fronde, in his childhood.¹

While this portrait bears some resemblance to portraits of the king by Pierre Mignard (1640–1725),² it is notable for the unusual leonine motif on the monarch’s gold breastplate. The lions’ curious, awkwardly rendered faces, with narrowed, feline eyes, loom from the pauldron on his right shoulder and below his neck. Lions generally symbolized strength and royalty (as the ruler of the animal kingdom), but early modern European monarchs specifically adopted leonine imagery—particularly in martial portraits and the decoration of their suits of armor³—as a reference to the half-divine hero Hercules, who was celebrated in classical mythology for the superhuman strength that enabled him to vanquish the fearsome Nemean lion.

Although Louis XIV, the self-styled Sun King, is best known for his choice of the solar god Apollo as his emblem, he was also drawn to Hercules, especially in the more martial phases of his reign. Early depictions associating Louis XIV with Hercules portray the king conquering his enemies alongside the hero.⁴ By the 1660s, as Louis began to consolidate his image and his reign as an absolute monarch, Herculean references appeared in attributes worn by the king.⁵ No longer did he need the hero’s support; these portraits proclaimed that Louis himself was the embodiment of Hercules.⁶

There are at least three surviving examples by Petitot and his workshop depicting the king wearing armor featuring golden lions.⁷ The technique of the Nelson-Atkins enamel suggests that similar miniatures were originally produced in even greater numbers. The precise and delicately painted face and hair were rendered by Petitot himself, while the armor, the lions’ faces, and the flatly painted blue sash of the Order of the Saint-Esprit were probably added by studio assistants.⁸ This process, like the workshop practice of large-scale oil painters like Peter Paul Rubens (Flemish, 1577–1640), enabled Petitot to meet the ever-growing demand of his insatiable royal patron.

Notes

1. For historical context on this tumultuous era, refer to the classic, albeit provocative study by Orest Ranum, The Fronde: A French Revolution 1647–1652 (New York: W. W. Norton, 1993); and, more recently, David Parrott, 1652: The Cardinal, the Prince, and the Crisis of the Fronde (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020), which focuses on the final year of the conflict.

2. For instance, Pierre Mignard, Equestrian Portrait of Louis XIV, 1673, oil on canvas, 120 1/16 x 92 1/8 in. (305 x 234 cm), Galleria Sabuda, Turin.

3. Henri II of France, for example, had a spectacular set of gilded armor with embossed lion masks. Unknown (France), Lion Armor, ca. 1550, ferrous metal and gold, 68 1/8 in. (173 cm) high, Royal Armouries, London, https://royalarmouries.org/collection/object/object-34482. See also Michael Kwass, Contraband: Louis Mandrin and the Making of a Global Underground (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2014), 264: “From the Renaissance to the age of Louis XIV, French kings used the figure of Hercules to symbolize royal power.”

4. Gilles Rousselet after Charles Le Brun, Hercules with Louis XIV on a Chariot, 1653, illustrated in Veronique Meyer, Pour la Plus Grande Gloire du Roi: Louis XIV en Thèses (Rennes: Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2017), 38. This engraving, along with the lost painting by Le Brun, was made to commemorate the conclusion of the Fronde in 1653.

5. Attributed to Domenico Cucci (ca. 1635–1705) and Workshop, Figure of Louis XIV, 1662–64, gilt bronze and porphyry, 13 5/8 x 11 15/16 x 7 1/16 in. (34.6 x 30.3 x 17.9 cm), The Frick Collection, New York, https://www.frick.org/exhibitions/gregory/23.

6. It is notable, however, that by the time Charles Le Brun (1619–1690) was working on the painted decoration for the Galerie des Glaces (Hall of Mirrors) at the Château de Versailles, the king had rejected his proposed scheme featuring Hercules. Instead, the central image (1681–84) depicts Louis governing by himself, with no need for the support of mythical deities.

7. With thanks to Bernd Pappe for directing our attention to these closely related miniatures: Jean Petitot, Louis XIV of Bourbon, King of France, ca. 1670, enamel on gold, 1 1/16 x 13/16 in. (2.7 x 2.1 cm), House of Orange-Nassau, Netherlands; Jean Petitot, Portrait of Louis XIV as Hercules, n.d., gold, tortoiseshell, enamel, dimensions unknown, Fondation Napoléon, Paris, https://napoleon.arteia.com/artworks/5e384c876d3a2d239a61526a; Jean Petitot, Louis XIV, n.d., 1 in. (2.5 cm) high, sold at Sotheby’s, London, November 10, 1969, lot 11.

8. We are grateful to Bernd Pappe, who examined this miniature during a visit July 23–25, 2023; notes in NAMA curatorial file.

John Lumsden Propert (1834–1902), London, 1887–1902 [1];

George Jay Gould (1864–1923), New York, by 1923 [2];

With Duveen Brothers, London, by 1923 [3];

Harry Seal (1873–1948), Ullesthorpe House, Leicestershire, England, by 1948;

Purchased from his posthumous sale, The Choice Collection of Portrait Miniatures formed by the late Harry Seal, Esq., Christie, Manson, and Woods, London, February 16, 1949, lot 142, as A Gentleman, Temp. Louis XIV, by H. E. Backer, London, 1949 [4];

Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, by 1958 [5];

Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1958.

Notes

[1] John Lumsden Propert was an English physician, art critic, and collector with a particular interest in portrait miniatures. This publication was illustrated in George Williamson, Portrait Miniatures: From the Time of Holbein 1531 to that of Sir William Ross 1860; A Handbook for Collectors (London: George Bell, 1897), 96 (facing).

[2] It is unknown when he acquired or sold the miniature, but it is illustrated on page 35 of an unpublished Duveen stock album from the collection of George Jay Gould, and may have been in his hands by 1914, when an inventory was made of the Gould estate, or after Gould’s death in 1923. Duveen Brothers, George J. Gould collection, undated, Series I.B., Box 45, The Getty Research Institute, Special Collections, Los Angeles. With thanks to Starr intern Bailey McCulloch for uncovering this reference. Gould, the son of financier Jay Gould (1836–1892), was an art collector and sportsman who acquired fashionable Old Masters, decorative arts, and portrait miniatures in the style of other Gilded Age collectors.

[3] Likewise, it is unknown when the Duveens acquired or sold the miniature, but it is illustrated on page 35 of an unpublished stock album from the collection of George Jay Gould, and may have been in their hands by 1914, when an inventory was made of the Gould estate, or after Gould’s death in 1923. Duveen Brothers, George J. Gould collection, undated, Series I.B., Box 45, The Getty Research Institute, Special Collections, Los Angeles.

[4] The lot is described in the catalogue as, “A Gentleman, Temp. Louis XIV, by Jean Petitot. Three-quarter face to the left, his coat decorated with lions’ masks, with blue cloak and long curling back hair. Oval – 1 1/8 in. high – in gold frame.” H. E. Backer seems to be the name Backer used professionally, but his full name is Hans Edmund Backer, and he was a London and Rome-based art dealer. Backer sometimes bid for the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. His name comes up in Starr correspondence (See letter of October 11, 1955, University of Missouri-Kansas City archives, Box 22, Folder 9).

[5] It is possible that the Starrs acquired this miniature from Backer (see note 4) after the conclusion of the Seal sale, from which they had directly purchased several miniatures. For example, a miniature by Samuel Cooper, Portrait of Dorothy Spencer, Countess of Sunderland, F58-60/14, was also acquired from Backer from the Seal sale and was in the possession of the Starrs by 1958.

Jean Petitot, Louis XIV of Bourbon, King of France, ca. 1670, enamel on gold, 1 1/16 x 13/16 in. (2.7 x 2.1 cm), House of Orange-Nassau, Netherlands.

Jean Petitot, Portrait of Louis XIV as Hercules, n.d., gold, tortoiseshell, enamel, dimensions unknown, Fondation Napoléon, Paris.

Jean Petitot, Louis XIV, n.d., 1 in. (2.5 cm), sold at Sotheby’s, London, November 10, 1969, lot 11.

Attributed to Jean Petitot, Portrait of Louis XIV, n.d., enamel, 1 3/8 x 1 3/16 in. (3.5 x 3 cm), sold at Genève Enchères, Geneva, December 6, 2023, lot 82.

Exhibition of Portrait Miniatures, Burlington Fine Arts Club, London, 1889, no. 55, 101; or no. 75 or no. 78 or 87, p. 103, as Louis XIV.

The Historical Collection of Miniatures Formed by Mr. J. Lumsden Propert, Fine Art Society, London, May 1897, no. 241, 36, as Louis XIV.

The Starr Foundation Collection of Miniatures, The Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, December 8, 1972–January 14, 1973, no cat., no. 22, as Louis XIV, King of France.

J. Lumsden Propert, Exhibition of Portrait Miniatures (London: Burlington Fine Arts Club, 1889), 101 or 103, as Louis XIV.

Catalogue of Miniatures, Enamels, Pastels, and Waxes at 112, Gloucester Place, Portman Square (London: William Clowes, 1890), 74, as Louis XIV.

Catalogue of the Historical Collection of Miniatures Formed by Mr. J. Lumsden Propert and Exhibited at the Fine Art Society (London: Fine Art Society, 1897), 36, as Louis XIV.

George Williamson, Portrait Miniatures: From the Time of Holbein 1531 to that of Sir William Ross 1860; A Handbook for Collectors (London: George Bell, 1897), 96 (facing), (repro.).

Catalogue of The Choice Collection of Portrait Miniatures formed by the late Harry Seal, Esq., (London: Christie, Manson, and Woods, February 16, 1949), lot 142, as A Gentleman, Temp. Louis XIV

Ross E. Taggart, ed., Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 265, as Louis XIV.

Ross E. Taggart, The Starr Collection of Miniatures in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery (Kansas City, MO: Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, 1971), no. 22, p. 14, (repro.), as Louis XIV, King of France.

Ross E. Taggart and George L. McKenna, eds., Handbook of the Collections in The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Missouri, vol. 1, Art of the Occident, 5th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1973), 148, (repro.), as Louis XIV.