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PROPERTY FROM THE JOHN HOBBS COLLECTION JEAN DE SAINT-JEAN (ACTIVE 1671-1709) A PAIR OF SEATED LIFE-

Currency:USD Category:Everything Else / Other Start Price:NA Estimated At:55,000.00 - 75,000.00 USD
PROPERTY FROM THE JOHN HOBBS COLLECTION JEAN DE SAINT-JEAN (ACTIVE 1671-1709) A PAIR OF SEATED LIFE-
Property from the john hobbs collection JEAN DE SAINT-JEAN (active 1671-1709) A pair of seated life-size portraits of King Louis XIV and Queen Maria Theresa Oil on canvas 82 x 47 in. (208.9 x 120.2 cm) $55,000-75,000 Provenance Baron de Beaupolz, circa 1950; Esplunda, N‰rke, Sweden; Christie’s London December 13, 1996, lot 322. literature Thornton, Peter. Seventeenth-Century Interior Decoration in England, France & Holland, 4th ed. New Haven and London, 1990, pp. 203 and 410, fig. 188. Once ascribed as after Antoine Dieu (1662-1727), these canvases were unquestionably painted by Jean de Saint-Jean, also know as Jean de Dieu or Jean Dieu de Saint-Jean, which may explain the confusion His own engraving of this composition is known, which he inscribed pinxit. Louis XIV (1638-1715), King of France (1643-1715), known as Le Roi Soleil because of the general splendor of his reign, saw the revival of French trade, industry and agriculture as well as the army under the egotistical General Louvois (1641-1691). Louis was renowned for his love of the arts and architecture, epitomized at Versailles and in the satirical plays of MoliËre (1622-1673) and Racine (1639-1699). His marriage in 1660 to the daughter of Philip IV of Spain (1605-1655), Maria Theresa, was the culmination of a carefully orchestrated plan by the Papacy and the aristocracy to join the kingdoms of France and Spain, making them one of the most powerful Catholic unions in Europe. France was dominant throughout Europe under Louis’ reign, and he successfully sparked off the Dutch war with his ambition in the Spanish Netherlands. However, France was unable to retain its powerful position and was defeated in subsequent wars of the Grand Alliance (1687-1697) and Spanish Succession (1701-1714). Another crippling error of judgement made by Louis towards the end of his reign was the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685), ending toleration of the Protestants and driving many Hugenots into exile. This portrait depicts the newly married king at the height of his reign, but he did leave France a weaker country due to the enormous economic demands incurred by his military ambitions and artistic patronage.