Attributed to Nicolas Baudesson (French, 1611-1680). A still life of roses, hyacinths, carnations and other flowers in an ...

Description

Attributed to Nicolas Baudesson (French, 1611-1680)
A still life of roses, hyacinths, carnations and other flowers in an ornamental vase depicting the Flaying of Marsyas
Oil on canvas
18 x 14-1/4 inches (45.7 x 36.2 cm)

PROVENANCE:
Collection of Prince Vladimir Nikolaevich Argutinsky-Dolgorukov (1874-1941), St. Petersburg and Paris, circa 1921-1930;
[With]Galerie Au Vieux Paris, Paris, 1930;
Louis Aloysius Ferguson (1867-1940), St. Louis, Missouri, acquired from the above, 1930;
By descent to the present owner, San Mateo, California.

This elegant flower painting has had two notable 20th-century owners. The first was Prince V.N. Argutinsky-Dolgorukov, a well-known St. Petersburg art collector and connoisseur during the period 1910-20, and a curator at the Hermitage Museum following the 1917 revolution. Before moving to Paris in 1921, where he acquired the present still life, he donated his vast collection of more than 300 works to the Museum of Old Petersburg (now the State Museum of the History of Saint Petersburg). His collection included sketches and plans from leading 18th- and early 19th-century St. Petersburg architects, as well as paintings, water colors, drawings, engravings and lithographs, which depict views of the capital and plans for its construction. The second owner was the distinguished American electrical engineer, Louis A. Ferguson, who worked closely with Thomas Edison in the Chicago Edison Company and the Commonwealth Edison Company, having made important contributions to the development of low voltage distribution. His frequent trips to Europe to keep in touch with electrical engineering developments there enabled him to put together an attractive collection of European painting.

Dr. Fred G. Meijer of the Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie in The Hague has proposed on the basis of photographs that this flower piece can be "Attributed to Nicolas Baudesson (French, 1611-1680)," an artist highly influenced by Monnoyer.




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