Une Famille dans la désolation (A Grief-Stricken Family)

Artist: Pierre-Paul Prud'hon (French, 1758 –1823)

1821

European Art

Not on view


This composition, showing an impoverished family gathered in the murky light of a sparsely furnished garret, was initially conceived by Prud’hon as a collaboration with his pupil and longtime mistress, Constance Mayer. Following her suicide in May 1821, Prud’hon prepared this oil sketch and completed the full-scale version of the painting, now lost, as his final submission to the Salon before his own death little more than a year later. Une famille dans la désolation became the prototype for an entire genre of paintings popular throughout the nineteenth century: melodramatic scenes of the suffering urban poor.

Medium

Oil on canvas

Dimensions

unframed: 10 5/8 × 8 3/8 in. (27 × 21.3 cm)

Credit Line

Purchased with the Leonard C. Hanna, Jr., Class of 1913, Fund and a gift in memory of James Sherman Pitkin

Accession Number

2005.26.1

Culture

French

Period

19th century

Classification

Paintings

Disclaimer

Note: This electronic record was created from historic documentation that does not necessarily reflect the Yale University Art Gallery’s complete or current knowledge about the object. Review and updating of records is ongoing.

Provenance
Pierre-Paul Prud'hon; Charles Boulanger de Boisfremont, Paris, 1821–38; Bequeathed to his daughter, Mme. Power, 1838–64; Carles-Nicolas Odiot 1864–1869; Odiot Collection, March 25, 1869; Justin Courtois, 1869–76; Courtois Collection, March 28, 1876; Frederic Mallet, 1876–1920; Mallet Collection, May 20, 1920; Chrissoveloni collection, 1920–922; Camille Gronkowski, from 1923; Private Collection, to 2005; Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Conn.
Bibliography
  • Art for Yale: Collecting for a New Century, exh. cat. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Art Gallery, 2007), 235, 398–99, pl. 223
  • Elizabeth E. Guffey, Drawing an elusive line: the art of Pierre-Paul Prud'hon (Newark, Del.: University of Delaware Press, 2001), 228–233, fig. 169
  • Sylvain Laveissière and Harry N. Abrams, Inc., Pierre-Paul Prud'hon, exh. cat. (Paris: Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, 1998), 308–09, no. 217, fig. 217b
  • Galerie Cailleux, Exposition esquisses, maquettes, projets et ébauches de l'école française du XVIIIe siècle. Peintures et sculptures au profit de la Société des amis de l'enfance, exh. cat. (Paris: Galerie Cailleux, 1934), no. 72
  • Jules Guiffrey, L'Oeuvre de P.-P. Prud'hon (Paris: Armand Colin Editeur, 1924), 276–77, no. 746
  • Arthur Sambon and Joseph Billiet, L'Art français au service de la science française. Exposition d'oeuvres d'art des XVIIIe, XIXe et XXe siécles ... du 25 avril au 15 mai 1923 (Paris: Chambre syndic de la Curiositè et des Beaux-Arts, 1923), 13, fig. 32
  • Petit Palais, Exposition P.-P. Prud'hon : Palais des beaux-arts de la Ville de Paris (Petit-Palais): mai-juin 1922: catalogue., exh. cat. (Paris: Impr. G. Petit, 1922), no. 27
  • Galerie George Petit, Paris, Catalogue des tableaux modernes par Berche`re, A. Besnard, J.-E. Blanche ..., aquarelles, pastels, dessins ..., importantes aquarelles par Euge`ne Lami, sculptures ... composant la collection de M. Fre´de´ric Mallet, dont la vente ... aura lieu a` Paris,, sale cat. (1920), fig. lot 105
  • Edmond de Goncourt, Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre peint, dessiné et gravé de P.P. Prud'hon (Paris: Rapilly, 1876), 10–13
  • Hotel Drouot, Paris, Catalogue des tableaux anciens et modernes, objets d'art et de curiosité, miniatures, marbres, bronzes, porcelaines, meubles et tapisseries, dépendant de la succession de feu M. Odiot, sale cat. (1869), fig. lot 16
  • Hotel Drouot, Paris, Catalogue des dessins, compositions, portraits, études d'après nature et esquisses peintes par Prud'hon: légués par lui à M. de Boisfremont, et dont la vente aura lieu par suite du décès de Mme. Vve Power, née de Boisfremont, sale cat. (1864), fig. lot 94
Object copyright
No Copyright - United States
Additional information

Object/Work type

human figures (visual works)

Subject

families grief

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