Places to go in a hurry
Dali House hasn’t had anyone running frantically around since Nicolas Poussin showed up toting “Landscape with a Man Killed by a Snake”. Now here’s another Frenchman, Alexandre-Hyacinthe Dunouy (1757-1841), with another mysterious flight through the woods.
“A Neo-classical Landscape with a Young Woman Running on a Path” is the title that Sotheby’s Paris credits to this curious relic, which it’s trying to sell for, hmmm, who’ll bid 15,000 euros? It’s in the “Old Master Paintings and Drawings” auction on June 25.
A Paris Salon regular, Dunouy specialised in landscapes, often with historic or palatial buildings and once, memorably, with Vesuvius erupting, a commission from Louis XIII. He was “associated with the artists known as little masters”, as one online source puts it, meaning fans of classical, highly detailed scenes.
But I’ve found no explanation as to why the young woman in this piece is on the lam. And on closer examination, she appears to be a nun!
Maybe we should have a caption contest.
