Baroque and Rococo

 

Baroque and Rococo Art Map

Jean-Marc Nattier



 

Jean-Marc Nattier

(b Paris, 17 March 1685; d Paris, 7 Nov 1766).

Brother of Jean-Baptiste Nattier. As well as being taught by his father, he trained with his godfather, Jean Jouvenet, and attended the drawing classes of the Académie Royale, where in 1700 he won the Premier Prix de Dessin. From around 1703 he worked on La Galerie du Palais du Luxembourg. The experience of copying the work of Rubens does not, however, seem to have had a liberating effect on his draughtsmanship, which was described by the 18th-century collector Pierre-Jean Mariette as ‘cold’. Nattier was commissioned to make further drawings for engravers in the early part of his career, including those after Hyacinthe Rigaud’s famous state portrait of Louis XIV (1701; Paris, Louvre) in 1710, which indicates that he had established a reputation while he was still quite young. Although he was offered a place at the Académie de France in Rome on the recommendation of Jouvenet, Nattier preferred to remain in Paris and further his career. In 1717 he nevertheless made a trip to Holland, where he painted portraits of Peter the Great and the Empress Catherine (St Petersburg, Hermitage). The Tsar offered Nattier work at the Russian court, but the artist declined the offer. He remained in Paris for the rest of his life.

 

Madame de Caumartin as Hebe
1753
Oil on canvas
National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.


 

Manon Balletti
1757
Oil on canvas
National Gallery, London