Seventeenth century French allegory of autumn, a young woman with fruit beneath a tree in a harvest landscape, oil on panel in its original painted frame

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French School, Allegory of Autumn, Oil on Wood Panel, 17th Century, in its Painted Frame

French School, 17th century

Price $3,920 USD

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The seventeenth century allegory panel resting on a marble-topped commode in a light Parisian room, showing the scale of the framed panel

Angled view of the allegory panel showing the double painted frame, the wide outer rail with running strapwork and the finer inner moulding

Detail of the allegory panel showing the seated figure with a sickle and a sheaf of fruit and flowers, a cut field at her feet and thatched buildings beyond

Detail of the allegory panel showing the seated figure holding a cornucopia of fruit and a sickle, with a basket of fruit spilling at her feet

Detail of the lower left of the allegory panel showing the cut field, the thatched farm buildings and the painted inner moulding of the frame

Detail of the allegory panel showing the wooded landscape, a haystack beside the thatched farm buildings and the yellow sky breaking low behind the trees

Detail of the allegory panel showing the wooded landscape, the haystack beside the farm roofs and the golden light breaking low along the horizon

Detail of the allegory panel showing the fruiting tree above the figure, the haystack among the farm roofs and the vertical split running down the panel

Detail of the allegory panel showing the seated figure with her sickle and cornucopia, the haystack and farm roofs rising behind her

Detail of the allegory panel showing the sickle held in the figure's hand, the thatched roofs behind and the vertical split running down through the paint

Oblique view of the allegory panel showing the depth of the frame and the painted ochre ornament running across all four rails

Macro of the paint surface showing losses down to the red-orange ground and the blistered, contracted texture of the dark passage

The allegory panel seen in raking light, showing the painted ornament of the frame and the uneven surface of the panel

Open mitre joint and hand painted honey scrollwork on the seventeenth century French frame corner

Painted reverse of the panel with yellow scrollwork and red highlights on a pegged corner-braced structure

Detail of the painted reverse showing yellow and red scrollwork cut off at the panel edge

Corner brace on the panel reverse, half-lapped over the earlier painted decoration

She has stopped working. The pruning hook is still in her right hand, but her eyes are closed and her head has fallen back against the trunk, and the fruit she has gathered is spilling out of a basket at her feet.

Oil on wood panel, 23 x 18 inches (58 x 46 cm), 30 x 25 inches (76 x 64 cm) framed, unsigned. French School, seventeenth century, in its painted frame.

A young woman sits at the foot of a fruit tree on the right, barefoot, in a loose golden dress. She holds a bound sheaf of fruit and flowers against her shoulder and a small curved pruning hook in the other hand. The tree above her is hung with red fruit among dark leaves. To the left the ground opens onto a cut field with sheaves lying on the stubble, and beyond it a group of thatched farm buildings stands among tall trees, with a pale sky breaking low on the horizon. The whole panel is worked in warm browns and golds, and the figure and the fruit carry all the light.

Painted on the back as well
The four rails carry a running honey strapwork on brown, and the same ornament continues on the reverse of the panel itself. Nobody decorates the back of a picture that is going to hang against a wall. This one was set into something, a panelled room or a piece of furniture, where both faces could be seen, and it has kept the mounting it was born with. The frame is not a frame. It is what is left of the joinery.

She is one of four. The seasons were painted as sets for private interiors, each one a young woman with her attributes, and the other three are somewhere else.

Provenance ▾

Private European collection

Artist

French School, 17th century

Period

17th century

Origin

France

Style

French Baroque

Medium

Oil on wood panel

Signature

Unsigned

Frame

Moulded wood frame, the four faces hand painted with honey scrollwork on a brown ground, each side carrying a different motif, the same ornament continuing on the reverse of the panel. Worn along the top edge with the red ground showing, and the upper left mitre has opened.

Features

Original, one of a kind

Painting

23 x 18 inches

Framed

30 x 25 inches

Condition

The panel is sound in its later corner bracing, under the fine age craquelure normal to a seventeenth century panel. An area of lifting and small open losses in the foliage at the right, visible in the photographs, where the red ground shows through.

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