Jean II Restout

Jean Restout the Younger (26 March 16921 January 1768) was a French artist, who worked in painting and drawing. Although little remembered today, Restout was well-respected by his contemporaries for his religious compositions.

Biography

Restout was born in the city of Rouen in Normandy on 26 March 1692. He was a son and pupil of Jean Restout the Elder, a church painter from Caen. His mother, Marie Madeleine Jouvenet ( – before 1729), was also an artist and a sister of the famed painter Jean Jouvenet.

Jean Restout the Elder died suddenly in 1702 and thereafter two of his brothers, the artists Jacques and Eustache, cared for the ten-year-old Restout. In 1707, following their introduction to one another by Eustache, Restout entered Jouvenet's studio in Paris. He rose to a position of some importance while there, even assisting his uncle in the completion of his last commissions. Furthermore, Jouvenet gave Restout the majority of his many drawings, a number of which were figure studies.

On 29 May 1717, Restout was admitted to the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture as an ''agréé'' or associate following his submission of the painting V''enus Ordering Arms from Vulcan for Aeneas''. He evidently prepared an additional, complementary work for the Academy entitled ''Venus Presenting Arms to Aeneas''. Both paintings may have been composed in anticipation of that year's Prix de Rome competition, but apparently Restout only thought about entering the contest as he was not among the April finalists.

Restout's career as a religious painter began in earnest in 1730, when he received a dual commission from the Benedictine abbey at Bourgueil near Chinon. Both paintings, the ''Ecstasy of St Benedict'' and the ''Death of St. Scholastica'', center around monastic figures.

In 1729, Restout married Marie-Anne Hallé (1704–1784), daughter of Academy painter Claude-Guy Hallé. In 1732, she gave birth to their only child, Jean-Bernard Restout. He, like his father, had a successful, though rather conventional, painting career: he won the Prix de Rome in 1758, was admitted to the Academy in 1769, and exhibited regularly at the Paris Salon.

Restout died in the Louvre Palace on 1 January 1768. His late baroque classicism rendered his altarpieces, such as the ''Death of St. Scholastica'' an isolated achievement that ran counter to his rococo contemporaries.

Selected works

* ''Saint Bruno in Prayer'' (1711) ''–'' Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dole.
* ''Portrait of Dom Louis Daudouin du Basset, a Carthusian monk of Gaillon'' (1716) ''–'' Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen.
* ''Venus Ordering Arms from Vulcan for Aeneas'' (1717) – Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
* ''Venus Presenting Arms to Aeneas'' (1717) – Ottawa, National Gallery of Canada.
* ''Alpheus and Arethusa'' (1720) ''–'' Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen.
* ''Ecstasy of St Benedict'' (1730) ''–'' Musée des Beaux-Arts de Tours.
* ''Death of St Scholastica'' (1730) ''–'' Musée des Beaux-Arts de Tours.
* ''Alexander and his Doctor'' (1747) ''–'' Musée de Picardie, Amiens.
* ''Martyrdom of St. Andrew'' (1749) ''–'' Musée de Grenoble.
* ''Triumph of Bacchus and Ariadne'' (1757) ''–'' Sanssouci, Potsdam.
* ''Orpheus and Eurydice'' (1763) ''–'' Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rennes.

Gallery

Paintings

File:Saint Bruno in Prayer, by Jean Restout the Younger (1711).jpg, ''Saint Bruno in Prayer'' (1711)
File:Venus Ordering Arms from Vulcan for Aeneas LACMA M.2010.129 (1 of 2).jpg, ''Venus Ordering Arms from Vulcan for Aeneas'' (1717)
File:Alpheus and Arethusa, by Jean Restout the Younger (1720).jpg, ''Alpheus and Arethusa'' (1720)
File:Death of St. Scholastica, by Jean Restout the Younger (1730).jpg, ''Death of St Scholastica'' (1730)
File:Jean II Restout - Pentecôte.jpg, ''Pentecost'' (1732)
File:Boy in a Child's Chair (Jean Restout d.y.) - Nationalmuseum - 17885FXD.jpg, ''Boy in a Child's Chair'' or ''Portrait de Jean-Bernard Restout'' (1736)
File:Martyrdom of St. Andrew, by Jean Restout the Younger (1749).jpg, ''Martyrdom of St. Andrew'' (1749)
File:Le Triomphe de Bacchus et d’Ariane - Restout.jpg, ''Triumph of Bacchus and Ariadne'' (1757)

Drawings

File:Seated Carthusian Holding an Open Book MET DT8807.jpg, ''Seated Carthusian Holding an Open Book'' (1711)
File:Head of a Bearded Man MET DP808065.jpg, ''Head of a Bearded Man'' ()
File:Funeral of François Duplessis de Mornay MET DP812089.jpg, ''Funeral of François Duplessis de Mornay''

Notes and references

Notes

References

Further reading

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External links

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Restout, Jean
18th-century French painters
French male painters
1692 births
1768 deaths
Artists from Rouen
18th-century French male artists
Members of the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture