Trophime Bigot
Encyclopedia
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
painter of the Baroque
Baroque art
Baroque painting is the painting associated with the Baroque cultural movement. The movement is often identified with Absolutism, the Counter Reformation and Catholic Revival, but the existence of important Baroque art and architecture in non-absolutist and Protestant states throughout Western...
era, active in Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
and his native Provence
Provence
Provence ; Provençal: Provença in classical norm or Prouvènço in Mistralian norm) is a region of south eastern France on the Mediterranean adjacent to Italy. It is part of the administrative région of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur...
.
Bigot was born in Arles
Arles
Arles is a city and commune in the south of France, in the Bouches-du-Rhône department, of which it is a subprefecture, in the former province of Provence....
in 1579, where he began his artistic career. Between 1620 and 1634, Bigot was in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, including Rome. He is known to have been in Arles in 1634, where he painted the altarpiece Saint Laurent condamné au supplice (Saint Laurence Condemned to Torture) and Assomption de la Vierge (Assumption of the Virgin) for local churches.
Between 1638 and 1642, he lived in Aix-en-Provence
Aix-en-Provence
Aix , or Aix-en-Provence to distinguish it from other cities built over hot springs, is a city-commune in southern France, some north of Marseille. It is in the region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, in the département of Bouches-du-Rhône, of which it is a subprefecture. The population of Aix is...
, where he painted another Assumption of the Virgin. He returned to Arles in 1642, and divided his activities between this city and Avignon
Avignon
Avignon is a French commune in southeastern France in the départment of the Vaucluse bordered by the left bank of the Rhône river. Of the 94,787 inhabitants of the city on 1 January 2010, 12 000 live in the ancient town centre surrounded by its medieval ramparts.Often referred to as the...
, where he died around 1650.
Bigot has always been known from his documented altarpieces in Provence, but the English art historian Benedict Nicolson
Benedict Nicolson
Benedict Nicolson, MVO was a British art historian and author.Nicolson was the elder son of authors Harold Nicolson and Vita Sackville-West and the brother of writer and politician Nigel...
was the first to propose that he was identical with the artist called Maître à la chandelle (Candlelight Master), who was active in Rome, producing relatively small candle-lit scenes with heavy but subtle chiaroscuro
Chiaroscuro
Chiaroscuro in art is "an Italian term which literally means 'light-dark'. In paintings the description refers to clear tonal contrasts which are often used to suggest the volume and modelling of the subjects depicted"....
in a style similar to that of Georges de la Tour
Georges de La Tour
Georges de La Tour was a French Baroque painter, who spent most of his working life in the Duchy of Lorraine, which was temporarily absorbed into France between 1641 and 1648...
. He connected a figure documented in Italy as variously Teofili Trufemondi/Trofamonti/Troffamondi/Bigotti with this artist, and suggested these were Italian versions of Bigot's names. This theory was much disussed, and for a while many believed that there were two Trophime Bigots, father and son. It is now generally accepted that the two artists were the same man, who painted in two different styles according to the different demands of the Roman and Provençal markets; “It seems, however, that Bigot was simply adapting to new circumstances.” However acceptance of this theory is notably lower in Italy; the Galeria Doria Pamphili in Rome still attribute the boy with candle above to "Maestro Giacomo", and the National Gallery at Palazzo Barberini
Palazzo Barberini
Palazzo Barberini is a palace in Rome, facing the piazza of the same name in Rione Trevi and is home to the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica.-History:...
hang works attributed to Bigot and the Candlelight Master in the same room, with the assertion that the styles and lighting are different.
After he returned to France, Bigot produced altarpieces, at Arles and at Aix-en-Provence, that are in a very different and more conventional style from the Roman candle-lit works. In the Roman works the light-source is usually either a single candle, which for an extra softness of light is sometimes shown held in a bag-like paper, as in the works in Vienna and Bordeaux. As with de la Tour, the same subjects are often repeated in differing compositions, with many St Jeromes and at least four versions of St. Sebastian Aided by St. Irene: in Bordeaux, the Vatican Pinacoteca, Bob Jones University
Bob Jones University
Bob Jones University is a private, for-profit, non-denominational Protestant university in Greenville, South Carolina.The university was founded in 1927 by Bob Jones, Sr. , an evangelist and contemporary of Billy Sunday...
in South Carolina
South Carolina
South Carolina is a state in the Deep South of the United States that borders Georgia to the south, North Carolina to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Originally part of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was one of the 13 colonies that declared independence...
, and the Portland Art Museum
Portland Art Museum
The Portland Art Museum in Portland, Oregon, United States, was founded in 1892, making it the oldest art museum on the West Coast and seventh oldest in the United States. Upon completion of the most recent renovations, the Portland Art Museum became one of the twenty-five largest art museums in...
in Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
.
About 40 paintings, distributed amongst various museums, have been attributed to Bigot, among them:
- Saint Sebastian Aided by Irene (BordeauxBordeauxBordeaux is a port city on the Garonne River in the Gironde department in southwestern France.The Bordeaux-Arcachon-Libourne metropolitan area, has a population of 1,010,000 and constitutes the sixth-largest urban area in France. It is the capital of the Aquitaine region, as well as the prefecture...
, Musée des beaux-arts, with other versions in the Vatican Pinacoteca and two in the USA) - VanityVanityIn conventional parlance, vanity is the excessive belief in one's own abilities or attractiveness to others. Prior to the 14th century it did not have such narcissistic undertones, and merely meant futility. The related term vainglory is now often seen as an archaic synonym for vanity, but...
(Rome, Corsini Palace) - Saint JeromeSaint JeromeSaint Jerome is a Christian church father, best known for translating the Bible into Latin.Saint Jerome may also refer to:*Jerome of Pavia , Bishop of Pavia...
(Rome, Corsini Palace, and other versions) - Saint Laurence Condemned to Torture, altarpiece restored by the organization Monuments Historiques (Arles, Church of Saint-Césaire)
Further reading
- J.P. Cuzin, “Trophime Bigot in Rome: a suggestion,” Burl. Mag., CXXI (1979).
- J. Boyer, “The Only and Only Trophime Bigot,” Burl. Mag., CXXX (1988).