Dimensions: 12 3/4 × 9 1/16 in. (32.39 × 23.02 cm) (plate)17 3/16 × 11 in. (43.66 × 27.94 cm) (sheet)
Copyright: Public Domain
This etching by Jean Claude Richard, Abbé de Saint-Non, presents a collection of architectural and sculptural studies. Dominating the composition are the classical motifs: a fountain adorned with a sculptural relief, a seated god-like figure, a pyramid and a double-faced herm. Consider the double-faced herm, reminiscent of the Roman god Janus, guardian of doorways and transitions. Janus embodies duality, looking simultaneously to the past and the future. This motif echoes through time, reappearing in Renaissance emblems, and even in modern psychological studies where it symbolizes the conscious and subconscious mind. The emotional resonance of such imagery lies in its ability to tap into our collective unconscious, a concept Jung would have appreciated. The double-faced figure pulls us, triggering a deep-seated awareness of life’s inherent polarities: beginning and end, male and female, light and shadow. Observe how such symbols have been continuously reinterpreted, their essence surviving, their forms evolving, echoing through the corridors of time and human experience.
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The Jean-Baptiste Claude Richard (also known by his title abbé Saint-Non) embodied the important role of the amateur, an patron and connoisseur of the arts as well as a practitioner in 18th-century France. He was a skilled networker, a curious, innovative printmaker, and he supported his artist friends in their projects and travels. Saint-Non executed this suite of prints in Paris in 1763, representing antique fragments and reliefs he saw during his travels in Italy from 1759 to 1761. Most of the monuments are identified in the inscriptions by their locations in Rome. The works reflect French artists’ fascination with antiquity at the time, and the way in which these sources were transmitted to a larger public through the circulation of prints. Remarkably the suite of etchings remain as originally issued, in three groups of six deckle-edged sheets stitched together simply along the top edge.
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