XIII - Paintings and Drawings - Marty de Cambiaire

The brown tones of the painting and the facial types of the
male figures help to date the work to the artist’s Bolognese
apprenticeship, that is, rather early in his career. The subject
is very rare: the painter at work before a large canvas whose
subject is reminiscent of that invented by the Greek painter
Timanthes (end of the 5 th – beginning of the 4 th century B.C.)
and described by Pliny in his Natural History as “… an artist
highly gifted with genius. (…) There are also some other proofs
of his genius, a Sleeping Cyclops, for instance, which he had
painted upon a small panel; but being desirous to convey
the idea of his gigantic stature, he has painted some Satyrs
near him measuring his thumb with a thyrsus. Timanthes is
the only one among the artists in whose works there is always
something more implied by the pencil that is expressed….” 1
The authors of satyric dramas also introduced Satyrs in
order to highlight an element of the subject or to create a
contrast. Although in Book IX of Odyssey there is no mention
of Satyrs on the Cyclops island, Euripides introduces them
in his play Cyclops making them run aground on the island.
Satyrs compose a choir which helps Euripides, like the painter
Timanthes in his painting, to highlight certain elements and
play on contrast of tones. Samuel Van Hoogstraten, painter,
engraver and theoretician of the 17 th century, also commented
on the subject explaining the introduction of Satyrs by the fact
that the small size of Timanthes’s “tableautin” made it difficult
to demonstrate the large size of Cyclops. 2
The subject has been rarely treated in painting, unlike that
of the blinding of the Cyclops that represents one of the
most famous episodes in Odysseus’s adventures. However,
we can mention a precedent in the frescos, today lost, by
Giulio Romano in the Villa Madama, which Francisco de
Hollanda hailed in his “Dialogues in Rome” 3 and which
Vasari cited as well. There is a drawing of this composition
after Giulio Romano in the Louvre, which represents The
Sleeping Polyphemus surrounded by Satyrs. Two of the
Satyrs are busy measuring his feet but their size is like that
of Lilliputians, which brings to mind the fact that the subject
was sometimes connected with that of The Sleeping Hercules
Beset by Pygmies. Both works reveal the skill of the painter to
pass from one scale to another accurately reproducing correct
anatomical proportions 4 . Both are equally characteristic of a
certain spirit of Mannerism which combines humour with
drollery and intellectual references.
Surprisingly, the Cyclops has not been depicted with one eye.
It is true that since Roman time, the number and location of
the Cyclops’ eyes has varied depending on interpretation.
Most often, the Cyclops has been represented three-eyed
with the third eye sometimes rather awkwardly placed on
the forehead or at the root of the nose. However, on certain
Greek kraters, the third eye is mising. And the Cyclops on
the frescos of the House of Meleager, Pompei, also seems to
have two eyes. Thus, the execution of the Cyclops’s third eye
seems to have long created problems to the artists, certainly
because it rendered his appearance monstrous. In the present
painting, Ferretti might have wanted to show the incomplete
stage of the painting inside the painting and that the artist
represented from behind may have kept this important detail
for the final stage. It might have also been a way of voluntarily
complicating the identification of unusual imagery in order to
confuse or entertain collectors and patrons.
Although the technique is more sketched than usual, this
small-size work perfectly reveals the humour characteristic
of Ferretti’s art, rather approaching it to a sort of caricature,
burlesque. Exaggerated musculature, exaggeratedly large
feet with the toes rather resembling small logs, the dynamic
pose of the painter and the liking for a rounded, full, plump
execution are all typical of Ferretti and can be found in his
other works, especially those of the beginning of his career.
1 Pliny the Elder, Natural History, trans. by John Bostock
(London, 1857).
2 Samuel Van Hoogstraten, Introduction à la haute école
de l’art de peinture, Droz, Geneva, 2006, translation,
comments and index by Jan Blanc, p. 310.
3 Francisco de Hollanda, Four Dialogues on Painting, Book
II
4 The correspondence between these two subjects was
mentioned by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1782) in
his Frammenti della seconda parte del Laocoonte, Milano
Edizioni, 1841, p. 46-49.
Gabriel André de Bonneval
Coussac-Bonneval 1769 – Saint-Myon 1839
Bouquet of Flowers on the edge of a fountain: Imperial
Lilies, Tulips, Double Hollyhocks, White Lilies, Gerberas,
Peonies, White Roses, Roses, Ipomoeas and Carnations
Oil on canvas
Signed and dated G A de Bonneval 1810 at lower right
117 x 91 cm (46 3 /8 x 35 7 /8 in.)
Exhibited
Possibly Paris, 1810 Salon, No. 100.
An amateur artist, Gabriel André de Bonneval is little known
today. From a family of knightly extraction admitted to the
court in 1786 and 1789, he studied in the Royal Military
School in Effiat, probably at the same time as Louis Charles
Antoine Desaix who was destined to become a great general
of Napoleonic campaigns. Bonneval then became a page
of the Grande Ecurie in 1783. Sous-lieutenant in Clermont
in 1787, captain in the regiment of Poitou and the regiment
of Berry during the Revolution, and captain of the Horse
Guards of the constitutional guard of the King, Bonneval
was seriously wounded for valiantly defending the estate of
Chantilly, which earned him the recognition of the prince de
Condé and the granting of the order of Saint-Louis. Barely
recovered, he was imprisoned for fifteen months, after which
period he was released by his prison guard and managed
to emigrate. According to the Illustrations de la Noblesse
Européenne, “during the creation of stud farms in 1806,
he was sought after by Napoleon and since that time until
1832, he had commanded with the titles of directeur and
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