Q72377127

Painted in 1668 and held in the Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, this work dates to a period when Noël Coypel was consolidating his reputation within the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture, of which he had become a member in 1663. The late 1660s were formative years for French Grand Manner painting: Colbert and Le Brun were mobilising artists to furnish the great royal residences, and ambitious painters competed for royal commissions by demonstrating command of large-scale figure composition, classical decorum, and the elevated subjects — mythological, allegorical, or historical — sanctioned by academic theory. Coypel's output during this decade shows the tension between Rubensian colour and the Poussinist linearity championed by Le Brun at the Académie's famous querelle du coloris. The Lille collection, built through centuries of regional patronage and Revolutionary-era confiscations, preserves significant holdings of French Baroque painting that complement the better-known Parisian institutions.

Characteristic of Coypel's 1660s manner, the composition relies on firm contour drawing inherited from Italian academic practice, tempered by warm Venetian colour notes absorbed during his Roman sojourn. Impasto accents enliven drapery passages, while the ground preparation gives shadow areas a settled, resonant depth.