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The Flight of Aeneas from Troy   Pierre Courteys (c. 1520–1591)

The Flight of Aeneas from Troy

Pierre Courteys (c. 1520–1591)

2nd half of the 16th century

this site may contain automatically translated text
Die Flucht des Aeneas aus dem brennenden Troja

Limoges enjoyed two golden periods as a centre for the manufacture of enamels. The first was in the middle ages – roughly from the twelfth century to 1370, the year when the city was sacked by Edward the Black Prince, which in effect killed it off – while the second was in the sixteenth century. Although these later enamels frequently adorn plates, ewers, and other at least potentially functional items, they are almost without exception the equivalents of pictures, and some – such as the present series of rectangular plaques – have no ostensible functional purpose and are instead purely decorative.
As was the case with the ‘istoriato’ (narrative) maiolica that was being produced in Italy at very much the same period, sixteenth-century Limoges enamels were not infrequently based upon print sources, whether for whole compositions or individual figures. Most are in black and white, which only increases the links with the world of prints, but – as here – they can also be resplendently coloured. It is no surprise, therefore, that six of the present group are directly derived from etchings by Jean Mignon after drawings in the Louvre by Luca Penni, an Italian associate of Giulio Romano, who moved to France around 1530. The seventh and last, on the other hand, is adapted from a fresco by Rosso Fiorentino, whose subject matter is far from clear but which is not part of the story of Troy, in the Galerie François Premier at Fontainebleau. This final scene is obviously meant to be read as the flight of Aeneas and his father Anchises from Troy, and it is the inclusion of a woman being carried by a second man, together with the absence of Aeneas’s son, Ascanius, from the scene that makes it an uneasy fit. For the rest, the plaques depict ‘Cassandra Stopping Deiphobus from Killing Paris’, ‘The Judgement of Paris’, The ‘Abduction of Helen’, a ‘Battle before the Walls of Troy’, ‘The Trojan Horse being Hauled into the City’, and ‘The Fall of Troy’, which almost without exception make perfect sense in this context.
Almost nothing is known about Pierre Courteys, but he may well have been a pupil or associate of Pierre Reymond. What is plain is that he was a favourite of the King, since he executed at least twelve gigantic reliefs, each nearly five and a half feet high, for the Château de Madrid (nine are now in the Musée de Cluny, and the other three in the United Kingdom), and sixteen Dürer-inspired plaques which were incorporated into a splendid altarpiece for the Château d’Ecouen (now in the Louvre). It is far from inconceivable that these plaques were another royal commission, not least since the French kings traced their legendary descent from Aeneas, a connection celebrated at much this time in poetic form in Pierre Ronsard’s epic ‘Franciade’, who began writing it in the 1540s, but whose first four books were not published until 1572. Certainly, the popularity of this sort of subject matter is attested to by the existence of a much more extensive and significantly earlier series of polychrome enamel plaques of unknown authorship based upon the ‘Aeneid’.

Material/technique
enamel on copper
Measurements
42 × 54 cm
Acquisition
acquired by Prince Joseph Wenzel I von Liechtenstein
Artists/makers/authors
Pierre Courteys
Detailed information
Inventory number
SK 226
Signature/inscriptions content only available in German
sign. unten links in Gold: .P.COURTEYS.
Provenance
acquired in 1738/40 by Prince Joseph Wenzel I von Liechtenstein, presumably during his stay in Paris
Place of origin
Limoges
Iconography
Flight of Aeneas from Troy
Literature
Johann Dallinger von Dalling, Description des Tableaux, et des Piéces de Sculpture, que renferme la Gallerie de son Altesse François Joseph Chef et Prince Regnant de la Maison de Liechtenstein, Vienne 1780, S. 97 (als Cresselli), Kat. 276-278

F.O. von Leber, "Archäologische Beschreibung einiger Ritterburgen und Schlossruinen im Kreise unter dem Wienerwald: Seebenstein, in: Berichte und Mittheilungen des Altertums-Vereins zu Wien 1 1856, S. 174

Adolf Kronfeld, Führer durch die Fürstlich Liechtensteinsche Gemäldegalerie in Wien, 3. Aufl., Wien 1931, S. XVI

Gustav Wilhelm, Die Fürsten von Liechtenstein und ihre Beziehungen zu Kunst und Wissenschaft, in: Liechtensteinische Kunstgesellschaft, Vaduz 1977, Bd. 1/1976, S. 9–180, S. 121

Clare Vincent, Ausst.-Kat. Liechtenstein. The Princely Collections, New York 1985, S. 220-221, Kat. 141

S. L. Caroselli, Ausst.-Kat. The Painted Enamles of Limoges, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles 1993, S. 134-149

Ausst.-Kat. Sammlungen des Fürsten von Liechtenstein, Uwe Wieczorek, Paul Reiles, Jean Luc Koltz (Hg.), Museée national d'histoire et d'art Luxembourg, Luxemburg 8.7.1995–3.9.1995, erschienen Luxemburg 1995, S. 83–84, Kat.-Nr. 62

Ausst.-Kat. Collections du Prince de Liechtenstein, Uwe Wieczorek, Paul Reiles, Jean Luc Koltz (Hg.), Musée national d’histoire et d’art de Luxembourg, Luxemburg 8.7.1995–3.9.1995, erschienen Luxemburg 1995, S. 69, Nr. 62, Abb. S. 81, Textband S. 83-84, Kat. 62

Ausst.-Kat. Princely Taste. Treasures from Great Private Collections, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem März–Juni 1995, erschienen Jerusalem 1995, S. 39-40

Dirk Syndram, Meisterwerke der Sammlungen des Fürsten von Liechtenstein. Skulpturen – Kunsthandwerk – Waffen, Vaduz 1996, S. 138-145 u. 296, Kat. 45

Ausst.-Kat. "Götter wandelten einst..." Antiker Mythos im Spiegel alter Meister aus den Sammlungen des Fürsten von Liechtenstein, Uwe Wieczorek, Liechtensteinische Staatliche Kunstsammlung (Hg.), Liechtensteinische Staatliche Kunstsammlung, Vaduz 11.9.1998, erschienen Bern 1998, S. 92-94, 146, 167, Abb. 93, Kat. 38

Ausst.-Kat. Liechtenstein. Die Fürstlichen Sammlungen, Regula Berger, Matthias Frehner und Rainer Lawicki (Hg.), Kunstmuseum, Bern 12.11.2016–19.3.2017, erschienen München 2016, S. 151, 161, Kat.-Nr. 87

Ausst.-Kat. Treuer Fürst. Joseph Wenzel I. von Liechtenstein und seine Kunst. Eine Ausstellung in der Reihe MÄRZ IM PALAIS im Gartenpalais Liechtenstein, Johann Kräftner, Katharina Leithner, Arthur Stögmann, Johann Kräftner (Hg.), Gartenpalais Liechtenstein, Wien 1.–31.3.2022, erschienen Wien 2023, S. 190–197, Kat.-Nr. 226

Discover more objects by

Pierre Courteys

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Das Urteil des Paris

The Judgement of Paris

2nd half of the 16th century

Das Urteil des Paris

The Judgement of Paris

2nd half of the 16th century

Das Trojanische Pferd wird in die Stadt gezogen

The Trojan Horse being Hauled into the City

2nd half of the 16th century

Das Trojanische Pferd wird in die Stadt gezogen

The Trojan Horse being Hauled into the City

2nd half of the 16th century

Der Kampf vor den Mauern Trojas

Battle before the Walls of Troy

2nd half of the 16th century

Der Kampf vor den Mauern Trojas

Battle before the Walls of Troy

2nd half of the 16th century

Kassandra verhindert die Ermordung des Paris durch Deiphobos

Cassandra Stopping Deiphobus from Killing Paris

2nd half of the 16th century

Kassandra verhindert die Ermordung des Paris durch Deiphobos

Cassandra Stopping Deiphobus from Killing Paris

2nd half of the 16th century

Die Einnahme Trojas

The Fall of Troy

2nd half of the 16th century

Die Einnahme Trojas

The Fall of Troy

2nd half of the 16th century

Der Raub der Helena

The Abduction of Helen

2nd half of the 16th century

Der Raub der Helena

The Abduction of Helen

2nd half of the 16th century

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