Villa Malta, Rome

(François Marius Granet)

FRANCOIS-MARIUS GRANET
Aix-en-Provence: 1775 – 1849

View of the Coliseum, from the convent of San Bonaventura on the Palatine.

Oil on paper, laid on canvas: 29 x 37 cm.

PROVENANCE:
Art Market, Paris.
John Lishawa – Patrick Matthiesen, London

Here, Granet takes his view of the Coliseum from the Convent of San Bonaventura, situated on the brow of the Palatine hill, behind which is the Villa Spada. On the descending hill below is the Vigne dell Abadia. Granet made two studies of the Convent of S. Bonaventura, viewed through an arch of the Coliseum: one, an oil on canvas and a slightly earlier plein-air oil sketch, both now in the Musée Granet. In the latter, freely painted sketch, the convent is seen though an arch, but placed further to right in the centre of the format ‘Roman Ruins’. The terrace seen on the right of the convent in the more finished picture is extended across the lower façade. Moreover, in the sketch the contours of the convent differ, as they do in Constantin’s earlier pen and ink study of the Palatine Hill seen from the Coliseum, with the convent to the right on the brow of the hill and the ruins to the left, with a valley beyond.
In the present view, the tower-like end structure of the roof line dominates, filling the left of the format, and emphasising the space in the centre composition and the slope to the Coliseum seen tucked below the brow of the foreground. The rustic pergola supporting the vine creates a pool of shade, which contrasts the light palette of the sky and the buildings. To stress the tranquil bucolic nature of the atmosphere Granet includes fruiting orange trees nestling against the wall to the left.
Granet‘s ‘en plein air’ Views of the Coliseum, in water colour and oil, a number of which are in the Musée Granet, are evidence of a fascination, which the painter documented in his diary, with the ruins of ancient Rome in general , and the Coliseum in particular. There are many technical similarities in the present painting and Granet’s other sketches, but equally, Granet employed several strikingly different styles in his small en plein air views. In his oil sketches he often uses a thick impasto to communicate the jutting of roof gables or the solidity of a mottled wall, as can be seen in his Veduta del tempio di Venere, oil on canvas, 60 x 73.2 cm (Musée Granet), where one also finds his fussy use of pointing dangling foliage of the vine extending across the rustic pergola. Conversely, in his watercolour studies a looseness of brush work and limpidity of medium often reveals his black lead underdrawing.
Perhaps the best example of Granet’s use of continually changing surface values to create both aerial and drawn perspective, as well as to capture the essence of the Italian light, can be seen in his finished Panorama of Rome from the Villa Malta, oil on paper, laid down on canvas, 31.5 x 42.5 cm. (Anglo American plc., London). Here, he employs the soft translucently of his watercolour technique to delineate the greens and forms in the foreground third of the composition, which is shrouded in shadow. He then contrasts this with the more thickly painted buildings in the middle and far distance, which are bathed in the afternoon sun.

FRANCOIS-MARIUS GRANET
Aix-en-Provence: 1775 – 1849
Born in the provincial town of Aix in southern France, François-Marius Granet, was one of the most famed and accomplished artists of the first half of the 19th century. The son of Etienne Granet, a master mason, he was admitted to a non-fee paying school of drawing. The school’s director, Jean-Antoine Constantin, recognizing Granet’s talent, took the young student into his studio where he met the younger Comte Auguste de Forbin (1777-1841). The two youths were to remain life-long friends.
In 1793, Granet left with the volunteers to defend Toulon, which was under siege. It was there that he was employed as a military draughtsman by General Jean du Teil. He subsequently joined Forbin in (who had to flee Aix) in Paris and, for a short time, entered the studio of Jacques- Louis David. In 1797, Granet submitted a small painting to the Salon, entitled Cloister, Church, rue St. Honoré, which was widely praised. By 1802, he has left for Rome with Forbin, where he became captivated by the ancient ruins:
“I decided to begin with some studies from nature. I chose the Coliseum. That monument had struck me as so handsome, both for its remarkable form and the vegetation that enveloped its ruins, and it produced such an effect against the sky! You find growing wallflowers, acanthus with its handsome stems and leaves so beautifully-edged, honeysuckle, violets – in short, such a quantity of flowers, that you could put together a guide to the plants from them). 1
Granet made numerous drawing and oil studies after these views. He met Simon Denis (q.v.), ‘a Flemish painter who did landscapes and animals with great talent’, who instructed and encouraged him. In 1810, his first major canvas, The painter Stella in prison, was purchased by the Empress Josephine. 2. In 1813, he became a member of the Accademia di San Luca. Granet returned to Paris in 1819 and in that year presented The choir of the Capucin Church in Rome at the Salon.3 This painting received universal praise and was particularly admired by Louis XVIII. It was ultimately purchased by Caroline, Queen of Naples.
Granet gained many important patrons, and after his success at the Salon in 1819, he was made Chevalier of the Légion d’Honneur. With Forbin’s support, Granet was appointed Curator at the Louvre in 1826 (his friend had been made Director of the Royal Museums ten years earlier). Granet was elected a member of l’Institut four years later and went to Versailles, at the request of Louis-Philippe, to establish a Museum of French History. In 1848 he retired to his native Provence.

1. In ‘’Memoirs of the Painter Granet.’’, Trans. Joseph Focarino. In Edgar Munhall, Francois-Marius Granet: watercolours from the Musee Granet in Aix-en-Provence, exh, cat. New York: The Frick Collection, 1988, pp. 3-60.
2. Now in the Pushkin Museum.
3. The Hermitage, St. Petersburg.

Private Collection, France