Nicolas LOYR ( Paris, 1624 - 1679) The Judgement of Solomon Oil on canvas The judgment of Salomon, oil on canvas, by N. Loyr 35.43 x 51.18 in. 90.0 x 130.0 cm Provenance: Probably sale of the estate of Carle van Loo fils; Paris, Hôtel d'Espagne, 28 February 1770, no. 6 ("Le Jugement de Salomon par Loir, dans le style du Poussin. Height 2ft 9in by 4ft wide [87.4 x 128cm]"); Probably an after-death sale of François Boucher; Paris, 18 February-9 March 1771, no. 42 bis ("Le Jugement de Salomon du mesme Nicolas Loyr. On canvas, 2 feet 9 inches high by 4 feet wide [87.4 x 128 cm]"); Anonymous sale; London, Sotheby's, 9 April 1986, no. 74 (as Thomas Blanchet); Anonymous sale; London, Sotheby's, 28 October 1987, no. 74 (as Thomas Blanchet); Galerie Jean-Max Tassel, Paris, circa 1992-1996 (as Nicolas Loir); Anonymous sale; Paris, Espace Tajan, 9 December 1999, no. 59 (as Nicolas Loir), repr. ; Anonymous sale; Paris, Hôtel Drouot, Mes Rieunier & Bailly-Pommery, 16 June 2000, no. 72 (as Nicolas Loir), repr. ; Anonymous sale; Paris, Hôtel Drouot, Mes Blanchet & Associés, 11 December 2006, no. 17 (as Nicolas Loir); Private collection, Bretagne Exhibitions: Les amis français à Rome de Nicolas Poussin, Paris, Galerie Jean-Max Tassel, 1993-1994, p. 26-28, repr. in colour p. 27 Bibliography: Lucie Galactéros de Boissier, Thomas Blanchet: 1614-1689, Paris, 1991, p. 377, PR 2 (repr. p. 376, fig. 294) Marcel-Jean Massat, L'œuvre de Nicolas Loir: peintre ordinaire du roi et recteur en son Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture, DEA dissertation, Paris IV, 1998, p. 36 Moana Weil-Curiel, "A propos de Nicolas Loir (1623-1679)", Revue du Louvre, no. 2, April 2000, p. 55 and p. 58, note 24. Gazette de l'Hôtel Drouot, 1 December 2006, p. 137, repr. The First Book of Kings (III, 16-28) reports that two women had each given birth to a child, one of whom died of suffocation, and they fought over the surviving child. To settle the dispute, Solomon ordered that the living child be divided in two and that each woman be given half. One of the women declared that she would rather give up the child than see it sacrificed. Solomon realised that she was the real mother and gave her the baby. This subject, which illustrates Solomon's wisdom, is often depicted in the arts. This superb painting is a fine example of one of Nicolas Loyr's long-recognised talents: that of a great colourist, who never hesitated to use sharp contrasts of colour, and that of a particularly gifted artist when it came to depicting young women and children. The choice of dense, luminous colours, including the use of lapis blue for certain draperies, and the rather characteristic type of figures and faces, fairly round with the eye drawn by the upper eyelid, confirm the reattribution of this painting to Nicolas Loyr by Jean-Max Tassel in 1994. At first glance, we recognise the illustrious model from which he drew inspiration here: the painting painted in 1649 (according to Félibien) by Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665) for Jean Pointel (c. 1585-1660) (Paris, Musée du Louvre1), whom he may have seen painting. In fact, Nicolas Loyr stayed in Rome from 1647 to 1649, in the company of Félibien, and they visited the painter on several occasions2. According to Bellori, Nicolas Poussin considered his Judgement of Solomon to be his best painting3: he has rarely shown himself to be so concerned with the moral charge and so careful to convey the intensity of the drama, both in the expression of the main characters and in his choice of raw colours. However, in contrast to his enduring reputation as a mere copyist of Nicolas Poussin or Sébastien Bourdon (1616-1671), who was his master, Nicolas Loyr brings a whole series of variations to his model: in a slightly larger format, he opens the scene onto a sky and architecture, rather similar to his Marriage of the Virgin preserved in Budaspest4, and he multiplies the number of figures, both in the foreground and the background, which lessens the moral and symbolic force of the subject and makes the painting more attractive to art lovers. The arrangement of arcades opening on to other architecture suggests that Nicolas Loyr re-used some of the sources that inspired Poussin: Christ disputing the doctors, engraved by Jan Wierix for Jérôme Nadal's Evangelicae historiae Imagines published in Antwerp in 15935 and the Peccatrix mulier (1568), engraving by Aliprando Caprioli after a drawing by Federico Zuccaro (1542/43-1609). However, unlike his model, he does not reproduce the position of the two women, which was directly inspired by the fresco in the Vatican Lodgings where Raphael treated this subject. A date of around 1650, immediately after his return from Rome, seems likely. One final detail, which testifies to Nicolas Loyr's enduring reputation: the young woman trying to hide the drama from her child, seen in the background on the right, inspired a French artist of the 18th century, when the painting retained its true attribution: a drawing in the Louvre6, annotated "Le Sueur" but now attributed to Pierre-Charles Trémolières, shows precisely this motif. 1- Nicolas Poussin, The Judgement of Solomon. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Inv. 7277, T 101 x 150 cm. 2- He was probably also familiar with the engraving by Jean Dughet published after 1653. 3- "affirmando esse la megliore da esso dipinta" Giovanni Pietrio Bellori, Le vite de' pittori, scultori et architetti moderni , scritte da Gio. Pietro Bellori, Mascardi, Rome, 1672, p. 452. A statement echoed by the great connoisseur Louis-Henri Loménie de Brienne (1636-1698) ("Le Poussin n'a jamais mieux peint"). 4- T. 108 x 140 cm. Budapest, Museum of Fine Arts, Szépművészeti Múzeum Inv. 667. 5- Matthias Bruhn, "A Source for Poussin's 'Judgment of Solomon", The Burlington Magazine, January 1995, p. 19-20. 6- Attributed to Pierre-Charles Trémolières, Femme dérobant son enfant à la vue d'un spectacle. Black stone, white highlights on grey-green paper, 295 x 170 mm. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des arts graphiques, Inv. 33142. This comparison is also due to Jean-Max Tassel. We would like to thank Mr Moana Weil-Curiel for kindly confirming the authenticity of this painting in an e-mail dated 16 April 2024 and for his help in writing this note. Nicolas LOYR ( Paris, 1624 - 1679) 90.0 x 130.0 cm The First Book of Kings (III, 16-28) reports that two women had each given birth to a child, one of whom had died of suffocation, and they were fighting over the surviving child. To settle the dispute, Solomon ordered that the living child be divided in two and that each woman be given half. One of the women declared that she would rather give up the child than see it sacrificed. Solomon realised that she was the real mother and gave her the baby. This subject, which illustrates Solomon's wisdom, is often depicted in the arts. This superb painting is a fine example of Nicolas Loyr's long-recognised talent: he was a great colourist, never hesitating to use sharp contrasts of colour, and was particularly gifted at depicting young women and children. The choice of dense, luminous colours, including the use of lapis blue for certain draperies, and the rather characteristic type of figures and faces, fairly round with the eye drawn by the upper eyelid, confirm the reattribution of this painting to Nicolas Loyr by Jean-Max Tassel in 1994. At first glance, we recognise the illustrious model from which he drew inspiration here: the painting painted in 1649 (according to Félibien) by Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665) for Jean Pointel (c. 1585-1660) (Paris, Musée du Louvre1), whom he may have seen painting. In fact, Nicolas Loyr stayed in Rome from 1647 to 1649, in the company of Félibien, and they visited the painter on several occasions2. According to Bellori, Nicolas Poussin considered his Judgement of Solomon to be his best painting3: he has rarely shown himself to be so concerned with the moral charge and so careful to convey the intensity of the drama, both in the expression of the main characters and in his choice of raw colours. However, in contrast to his enduring reputation as a mere copyist of Nicolas Poussin or Sébastien Bourdon (1616-1671), who was his master, Nicolas Loyr brings a whole series of variations to his model: in a slightly larger format, he opens the scene onto a sky and architecture, rather similar to his Marriage of the Virgin preserved in Budaspest4, and he multiplies the number of figures, both in the foreground and the background, which lessens the moral and symbolic force of the subject and makes the painting more attractive to art lovers. The arrangement of arcades opening on to other architecture suggests that Nicolas Loyr re-used some of the sources that inspired Poussin: Christ disputing the doctors, engraved by Jan Wierix for Jérôme Nadal's Evangelicae historiae Imagines published in Antwerp in 15935 and the Peccatrix mulier (1568), engraving by Aliprando Caprioli after a drawing by Federico Zuccaro (1542/43-1609). However, unlike his model, he does not reproduce the position of the two women, which was directly inspired by the fresco in the Vatican Lodgings where Raphael treated this subject. A date of around 1650, immediately after his return from Rome, seems likely. One final detail, which testifies to Nicolas Loyr's enduring reputation: the young woman trying to hide the drama from her child, seen in the background on the right, inspired a French artist of the 18th century, when the painting retained its true attribution: a drawing in the Louvre6, annotated "Le Sueur" but now attributed to Pierre-Charles Trémolières, shows precisely this motif. 1- Nicolas Poussin, The Judgement of Solomon. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Inv. 7277, T 101 x 150 cm. 2- He was probably also familiar with the engraving by Jean Dughet published after 1653. 3- "affirmando esse la megliore da esso dipinta" Giovanni Pietrio Bellori, Le vite de' pittori, scultori et architetti moderni , scritte da Gio. Pietro Bellori, Mascardi, Rome, 1672, p. 452. A statement echoed by the great connoisseur Louis-Henri Loménie de Brienne (1636-1698) ("Le Poussin n'a jamais mieux peint"). 4- T. 108 x 140 cm. Budapest, Museum of Fine Arts, Szépművészeti Múzeum Inv. 667. 5- Matthias Bruhn, "A Source for Poussin's 'Judgment of Solomon", The Burlington Magazine, January 1995, p. 19-20. 6- Attributed to Pierre-Charles Trémolières, Femme dérobant son enfant à la vue d'un spectacle. Black stone, white highlights on grey-green paper, 295 x 170 mm. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des arts graphiques, Inv. 33142. This comparison is also due to Jean-Max Tassel. We would like to thank Mr Moana Weil-Curiel for kindly confirming the authenticity of this painting in an e-mail dated 16 April 2024 and for his help in writing this notice.