The Judgment of Paris

Provenance

Commissioned by François du Val, marquis de Fontenay-Mareuil [1594-1655], Rome and Paris. Le Danois, Paris, by c. 1740. Angran, vicomte de Fonspertuis, by 1747; (his sale, E.F. Gersaint, Paris, 4 March 1748 and days following, no. 426).[1] purchased by Agard or Devins. Mr. [possibly W. or John] David, London; (his sales ["A Merchant of Respectability"], Christie's, London, 17 July 1819, no. 58, not sold, and 26-27 May 1820, 2nd day, no. 114); Urbino Pizzetta, London.[2] acquired 1912 by the father of Miss V. Price, England; by inheritance to her; (sale, Sotheby's, London, 6 July 1966, no. 9); (Thos. Agnew & Sons, Ltd., London); sold 13 February 1969 to NGA. [1] On the painting's early history, see Marcel Röthlisberger, "Claude Lorrain in the National Gallery of Art," _Report and Studies in the History of Art_ 1969, and Marcel Röthlisberger, _Claude Lorraine: The Paintings_, Vol. 1, New Haven, 1961: 254-255, no. LV94. Le Danois is recorded in the second index of the the _Liber Veritatis_, c. 1720. See also the provenance supplied by the Thomas Agnew and Sons invoice of 24 March 1969 (in NGA curatorial files). [2] Information about the 1819 and 1820 sales, and the purchaser in 1820, was provided by Lady Dorothy Lygon of Christie, Manson & Woods, letter of 21 September 1971 to J. Carter Brown (in NGA curatorial files). Pizzetta's collection was sold at Christie's on 15-16 April 1825, but the NGA painting was not listed in the catalogue, which identifies the seller as "Deceased."

The Judgment of Paris

Lorrain, Claude

1645/1646

Accession Number

1969.1.1

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

overall: 112.3 x 149.5 cm (44 3/16 x 58 7/8 in.) | framed: 143.5 x 182.3 x 8.6 cm (56 1/2 x 71 3/4 x 3 3/8 in.)

Classification

Painting

Museum

National Gallery of Art

Washington, D.C., United States

Credit Line

Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund

Tags

Painting Baroque (1600–1750) Oil Painting Canvas French

Background & Context

Background Story

The Judgment of Paris depicts the mythological contest in which the Trojan prince Paris awards the golden apple to Venus, setting in motion the events that lead to the Trojan War. Claude's treatment of this subject is characteristic: the mythological narrative is subordinated to the landscape setting, with the figures of Paris, Venus, Juno, and Minerva arranged as small elements in a vast and luminous Italian landscape. The compositional formula—framing trees on either side, a receding view to a distant town or mountain, and a golden atmosphere that unifies the scene—is the one that Claude had perfected by the mid-1640s and that would influence landscape painting for the next two hundred years.

Cultural Impact

The Judgment of Paris was one of the most frequently painted mythological subjects in 17th-century art, but Claude's version is unusual in its subordination of the narrative to the landscape. Where other painters (including Rubens) made the three goddesses the center of attention, Claude makes the landscape the protagonist and the figures merely incidental. This subordination of narrative to landscape was one of Claude's most revolutionary innovations, and it influenced not only landscape painting but also the development of landscape gardening and the English landscape garden.

Why It Matters

The Judgment of Paris is Claude's landscape philosophy in action: the mythological narrative is subordinated to the scenery, with Paris, Venus, Juno, and Minerva reduced to small figures in a vast Italian landscape. The judgment is not between three goddesses but between foreground, middle distance, and atmosphere—and atmosphere wins.