Attributed to Jacques SABLET

Attributed to Jacques SABLET
(Morges 1749-Paris 1803)
Portrait of Mathurin Crucy (1749-1826)
Canvas.
62 x 50 cm
Provenance: family of the model.

Related bibliography: catalogue of the exhibition
Les frères Sablet (1775-1815): Peintures, dessins et gravures,
Nantes, Rome, Lausanne, ed. Carte Segrete, 1985. Catalogue by Anne Van de Standt.
Mathurin Crucy began his architectural training in Jean-Baptiste Ceineray's studio in his hometown,
Nantes, and later entered the Academy of Architecture in Paris as a student of Etienne-Louis Boullée. In 1774, he won the "First Prize of the Academy" - which later became the Prix de Rome - for a project of "Public mineral water baths". In 1780, he was appointed road architect, in charge of the public roads of Nantes in place of his former master, Ceineray, and then in 1809 departmental architect.

Between 1780 and 1820, the city of the Dukes doubled its population and surface area. Commerce is flourishing and, in the midst of economic
growth, the city is becoming a vast construction site.

The architect gives the plans for public buildings, squares and new streets to be built. Among his
works, the Place Graslin - Crucy draws his inspiration from the Place de l'Odéon in Paris - which will house the Théâtre Graslin,
completed in 1788. Crucy also practiced building neo-classical mansions such as the Hôtel
Montaudouin in 1783 (today on the Place du Maréchal-Foch) or the Palais de la Bourse (1790 -
1815) in which Palladian reminiscences are clearly visible.
The Crucy family and the two Sablet brothers became friends in Rome from 1779-1780. The younger brother
of our model, Louis Crucy, went to Rome where his elder brother was a resident of the Académie de France.
They meet up again on their respective returns to Nantes. It was at this time that Jacques Sablet painted the Portrait of
Louis Crucy in the Paimboeuf shipyards (La Baule, private collection). Later, François Sablet
will represent Mathurin Crucy in an interior in 1815 (Nantes, family collection of Mathurin
Crucy's descendants). The architect was in constant contact with the Sablet brothers. Jacques Sablet granted him large loans
for his family business, the shipyards, and François joined him in Nantes in 1805.
In 1808, Mathurin Crucy proposed a plan for a pyramidal lighthouse for the city of Nantes inspired by Bonaparte's expedition to Egypt, but it remained in the drawing stage. He is the only non-Parisian
architect to be included in the body of the Report on the situation and progress of the arts in France since 1789 presented to
the Emperor the same year.

Like all artists of their time, Mathurin Crucy and his brother were Masons.
In our painting several Freemasonic elements appear: in the foreground, the column and in the second plan, the lighthouse
but also the pyramidal tripod on which the architect placed his documents or the compass in the centre of the
composition. Let us recall that Jacques Sablet's Roman elegy (Brest Museum) is often interpreted
as a Masonic symbolism. The hemicycle and the series of busts are reminiscent of Roman models, perhaps
that of the Casino of Pius IV or the Janiculum. Perhaps the column recalls the one Crucy planned to build in
Rome in 1789 to celebrate the beginning of the Revolution.

Our painting is a revival of the signed painting kept in a private collection.
Automatically translated by DeepL. To see the original version, click here.