Panthea, Cyrus, and Araspas
Laurent de La Hyre·1631-34
Historical Context
Laurent de La Hyre's Panthea, Cyrus, and Araspas depicts an episode from Xenophon's Cyropaedia, a classical text popular among educated Parisians. La Hyre was among the founders of the French Royal Academy in 1648 and helped establish the intellectual framework for French classical painting. This early work from the 1630s shows his developing classicism before the full influence of Poussin transformed Parisian taste.
Technical Analysis
The oil-on-canvas painting demonstrates La Hyre's emerging classical style with its balanced composition and clear, rational spatial organization. The palette features the warm tonalities and precise drapery rendering characteristic of Parisian painting before the ascendancy of Poussin's cooler classicism.
Provenance
Art market, Germany [according to Paris 1982, no. 31]. Sold at a public sale, Milan, to Ettore Viancini, Venice [letter of August 24, 1976 from Pierre Rosenberg to Patrice Marandel and note of conversation of Susan Wise with Patrice Marandel in curatorial file]; sold by Viancini to Gilberto Algranti, Milan and London [according to letter and note cited above]; sold by Algranti to Silvano Lodi, Campione d’Italia, and Bruno Meissner, Zurich, 1973 [according to letter and note cited above], passed solely into Meissner’s possession [letter from Bruno Meissner to Susan Wise dated May, 1981 in curatorial file]; sold by Meissner to Art Institute, 1976.
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