The Studio of an Antiquities Restorer in Rome

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The Studio of an Antiquities Restorer in Rome

Artist Hubert Robert (French, 1733-1808)

Dateabout 1783

DimensionsImage: 39 3/4 × 56 3/4 in. (101 × 144.1 cm)
Frame: 47 3/4 × 64 1/4 × 3 1/2 in. (121.3 × 163.2 × 8.9 cm)

Mediumoil on canvas

ClassificationPaintings

Credit LinePurchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey

Object number

1978.5

On View

Toledo Museum of Art (2445 Monroe Street), Gallery, 27

Label TextHubert Robert’s paintings of Italian ruins and fanciful views of crumbling, imaginary Paris buildings earned him the nickname “Robert des Ruines.” Here he incorporates ancient fluted columns and fragments of classical sculpture into an architectural fantasy of an art restorer’s studio. Most of the works depicted in the painting were real sculptures, such as the spotlighted reclining figure representing the Nile River and the standing figure of the philosopher Zeno of Elea. They would have been well known to the educated of the day. A romance is amusingly conducted in the cavernous space as a young man on a ladder balances precariously while stretching to hand a bouquet of flowers to a woman leaning out of a window. The clandestine but pure nature of their courtship is subtly commented on by the sculpture of the mythological secret lovers Cupid and Psyche in the shadows below them.Published ReferencesComments by critics reviewing the 1783 Salon are quoted by Michel and Ramband, p. v. (Appendix provided by dealer).

de Nolhac, Pierre, Hubert Robert, Paris, 1910, p. 141 as "Intérieur d'un Temple en Ruine a Rome."

Cailleux, Jean, ed., "L'Art du Dix huitième Siècle: On the subject of some works exhibited by the Galerie Cailleux at the Burlington International Fine Art Fair (notices drawn up by Marianne Roland Michel and Annette Rambaud)," an advertisement supplement to The Burlington Magazine, no. 34, Dec. 1977, pp. iii v, repr.

"A Hubert Robert for Toledo," Apollo, vol. 110, no. 208, June 1979, p. 496, repr.

"La chronique des arts," Gazette des Beaux-Arts, vol. 93, no. 1323, April 1979, repr. no. 199, p. 40.

"1978 Annual Report," Toledo Museum of Art Museum News, vol. 21, no. 1, 1979, p. 7, repr. p. 13.

"For the Record," Art Gallery, vol. 22, no. 4, May 1979, p. 43.

Cederlöf, Ulf., Pontus Grate, and Birgitta Sandström, På Klassisk Mark: Målare i Rom på 1780-talet, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 1982, no. 81, p. 74.

Hamilton-Phillips, Martha, "Museums and Exhibitions Forum: Toledo Museum of Art," Eighteenth Century Life, vol. 16, n.s., 2, May, 1992, p. 108, pl. 3.

Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo Museum of Art Masterworks, Toledo, 2009, p. 215, repr. (col.).

Faroult, Guillaume, Hubert Robert, 1733-1808: Un peintre visionnaire, Paris, Musee du Louvre, 2016, pp. 236-237, repr. (col.) p. 237.

Grasselli, Margaret Morgan, and Yuriko Jackall, et al., Hubert Robert, Washington DC, National Gallery of Art, 2016, pp. 234-235, repr. (col.) cat. 66, p. 156.

Exhibition HistoryParis, Salon, 1783, no. 61 ("L'intérieur d'un Atelier à Rome, dans lequel on Restaure des Statues antiques. Cet atelier est pratiqué et construit dans les debris d'un ancien temple.")

London, Royal Academy, Burlington International Fine Art Fair, 1977.

Stockholm, Nationalmuseum, På Klassisk Mark: Målare i Rom på 1780-talet, 1982.

Paris, Musee du Louvre; Washington, DC, National Gallery of Art; Hubert Robert, 1733-1808, March 7-October 2, 2016.