Unknown_Corot-2012

19 . Lamentation of Christ , c. 1850–55

Graphite on paper 8 x 12 inches ( 20 . 5 x 30 . 5 cm) Estate sale stamp lower left: Lugt 460 a

provenance Corot sale 1875 ; Sale, Piasa, Paris, December 17 , 2010 .

Private Collection

This dynamic compositional study dates from a period in which Corot was actively seeking official commissions for large, religious paintings. Though not a study for any known painting, the sheet is related in date and purpose to Corot’s first and only official commission, The Baptism of Christ ( 1845–47 , Church of Saint-Nicholas-du-Chardonnet, Paris), and to Saint Sebastian in a Landscape ( 1853 , reworked 1873 , Walters Art Museum, Baltimore) of the 1853 Salon. One of Corot’s sketchbooks, dated 1845–50 by the Louvre, includes two compositional sketches of religious subjects, both from the life of Christ: Rest on the Flight into Egypt and Lamentation (RF 8726 . 59 ). Interestingly, the sketches frame the composition with an arched top—the format of The Baptism of Christ and of St. Sebastian as well before Corot retouched it in 1873 . The present sheet is considerably larger, more detailed, and more resolved than the sketchbook drawing, and probably post-dates it. Corot’s facility with quick, expressive lines and reinforced contours, applied with varying degrees of pressure, is an aspect of his drawing practice which

emerges in the early 1850 s. Though the drawing could have been made either before or after Saint Sebastian , a date before the painting may be more likely. In revisiting the subject of the lamentation, now with a stronger emphasis on the Virgin cradling Christ’s upper body in her arms, Corot began to focus on the theme

of a suffering, reclining man being comforted by women.

far left: Saint Sebastian in a Landscape , 1853 , Walters Art Museum, Baltimore left: Lamentation of Christ, c. 1845–55 , Musée du Louvre, Paris, RF 8726 . 59