French painters, brothers
(Antoine, d. 1648, Louis, d. 1648, Mathieu, c. 1607-1677), who were born
at Laon but had all moved to Paris by 1630. The traditional birth-dates
for Antoine and Louis are 1588 and 1593, respectively, but it is now
thought that they were born shortly before and shortly after 1600, so
that all three brothers were of much the same generation.
Mathieu was made painter
to the city of Paris in 1633, and all three were foundation members of
the Academy in 1648. Apart from this, little is known of their careers
and the assigning of works to one or the other of them is fraught with
difficulty and controversy, for such paintings as are signed bear only
their surname, and of those that are dated none is later than 1648, when
all were still alive. The finest and most original works associated with
the brothers – powerful and dignified genre scenes of peasants – are
conventionally given to Louis; Antoine is credited with a group of
small-scale and richly coloured family scenes, mainly on copper; and in
a third group, attributed to Mathieu, are paintings of more eclectic
style, chiefly portraits and group portraits in a manner suggesting
influence from Holland. The brothers are also said to have collaborated
on religious works. Examples of all three types are in the Louvre.
In 1978-79 a major
exhibition in Paris brought together most of the pictures associated
with the brothers, but it raised as many problems as it solved. It also
confirmed the stature of Louis, whose sympathetic and unaffected peasant
scenes are the main reason why the Le Nains have attracted so much
attention. It has recently been proposed that the traditional
description of the figures in these paintings as ‘peasants’ is a
misnomer (they are said to be too well dressed for that) and that in
fact they represent members of the bourgeoisie.
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