MARC NATTIER (1642-1705)

Portrait of Gilbert de Seve 

Oil on canvas (117 x 88 cm)

Chateau de Versailles

To enlarge the picture, right-click on it and choose “Open in a new tab”

We normally associate the surname Nattier with Jean-Marc (1685-1766) the famous portraitist of Louis XV and his court, or even Jean-Baptiste (1678-1726). The fact that their father, Marc, was a portraitist is less well known, especially as no work attributed to him has survived with the exception of his two presentation pieces to the Royal Academy.

Marc Nattier became an Associate on 2nd March 1675 and was subsequently instructed to paint an Allegorical Portrait of the Marquis de Seignelay (1651-1690). To execute his sketch he copied his sitter’s face from a work by Claude Lefevre. Unfortunately, the result was not satisfactory and he was told to make a straightforward copy of the Lefevre portrait. When Nattier presented his work, in February 1676, the assembly gave him the additional task of painting a picture of Gilbert de Seve (1615-1698), a portraitist who worked with Lebrun at Vaux and Versailles, where he painted the ceiling in the Queen’s Bedchamber and the Gobelins. The work was submitted on June 26th of that year.

The portrait, which was thought to have disappeared, lost its attribution during the upheaval of the Revolution and was then mistakenly believed to be the Portrait of Nicolas Loir (Chateau de Versailles). Its recent identification by Christophe Hardouin has at last given us a chance to acquaint ourselves with the style of Marc Nattier the Elder.

The layout is formal if a little lacking in originality. Elegantly dressed, the sitter stands and poses for the spectator, gazing straight out of the picture at us. Clearly, no attempt has been made to give the impression of an artist interrupted in his work, as his occupation is suggested in a rather artificial way by just a sheet of paper and a pencil. Despite the sitter’s simple posture, the artist’s poor draughtsmanship becomes evident when looking at the draping of the right sleeve that tries to conceal the clumsy articulation of the wrist. Despite the perspective of the table and the glimpse of the landscape, the composition has a two-dimensional appearance, lacking in depth. The effect is accentuated by the lighting which does model the face but above all helps to emphasize the richness and diversity of the fabrics. Indeed, the artists clearly lavished a great deal of time on the accessories, highlighting the uneven surface of the tablecloth, the lace and the embroidery on the dressing gown with flair that, however, cannot hide his mediocre draughtsmanship.