Bethlehemite child murder (Poussin)
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| The Bethlehemite child murder |
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| Nicolas Poussin , 1625 or 1629 |
| Oil on canvas |
| 147 × 171 cm |
| Musée Condé , Grande Galerie, Chantilly , France |
The Bethlehemite child murder or child murder at Bethlehem is a painting by the French painter Nicolas Poussin . It was created in 1625 or 1629, depending on the source, and represents the biblical material of the child murder in Bethlehem . As the first work for a private collector, it influenced Poussin's later work as well as works by other artists. Today the painting can be seen in the Musée Condé in the northern French city of Chantilly .
description
In the large-format picture, three people can be seen in the foreground on a square that is bordered at the back by a temple or palace and on the left by columns. A Roman soldier in a red cloak is raising his sword to kill a baby lying on the ground. A kneeling woman also dressed in red, her face contorted with pain, tries to prevent the soldier from carrying out the murder. In the background, a second woman is fleeing with an already dead baby in her arms.
The whole picture is centered on the emotion of the woman in the center of the picture. The artist directs the viewer's gaze to the woman's face over two diagonals. One diagonal rises from the child's head over the soldier's thigh to the woman's head in the background. The second diagonal leads from the woman's garment, her upper body and the upper body of the soldier to the head of the same. Both diagonals meet in the woman's face.
The biblical material of King Herod the Great , who had all boys under the age of two killed because his scouts could not find him where the little Jesus Christ was , was processed by painters before Poussin. In contrast to these artists, who depicted the scene with many interacting figures, Poussin's image focuses on three people
history
The artist Nicolas Poussin arrived in Rome in 1624, probably coming from Venice and in deep poverty. In Rome he received several commissions, including the child murder in Bethlehem . The client, Vicenzo Giustiniani , ordered it to design a new property in Rome. Poussin's work was intended to be hung above a door and therefore not to be seen up close. This moved the artist to a rather simple depiction that emphasized the horror and emotions of the scene.
This commission, which for Poussin was the first from a private collector, was a great success. It earned the artist the recognition of all lovers of enlightened art of his time. It led the painter to concentrate on orders from private collectors and less on orders from the state or the church.
The picture came with the rest of Giustiniani's collection in 1807 to the collection of Lucien Bonaparte in Paris , who later left it to Maria Luisa of Spain . Her heir, Duke Charles II of Parma, sold it to London in 1840, where it changed hands several times. In 1854, Henri d'Orléans, duc d'Aumale bought it for £ 367.10. The painting has been housed there since the completion of the Great Galleries in Chantilly Castle in the 1880s. The painting has been in the possession of the Institut de France since the Duc d'Aumale donated the entire castle .
reception
The image influenced numerous artists over the years. Pablo Picasso studied it in detail during his Mediterranean period (1920–1922) and processed some elements, including the kneeling woman or the dead baby in his mother's arms, in his work Guernica .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Dr. A. Andresen: Nicolaus Poussin. List of the simultaneous and later copperplate engravings etc. made after his paintings , Leipzig 1863, p. 45
- ↑ a b c d e Académie d'Amiens, Portail éducatif du domaine de Chantilly: Fiche de l'œuvre Le Massacre des innocents (PDF; 4.9 MB), visited on February 20, 2013
- ^ French Ministry of Culture: Le massacre des innocents in Base Joconde, visited on March 24, 2013