A landmark account of the work, thought, and life of the seventeenth-century French painter In this book, Anthony Blunt presents a rich account of the paintings, life, and development of the great seventeenth-century French classicist Nicolas Poussin (1594–1665), addressing the artist’s entire oeuvre alongside his theory of art. Blunt shows why Poussin holds a central place in the great French humanist line that produced Racine, Molière, Voltaire, the Parnassians, and Mallarmé. At the same time, he examines how Poussin looks back to Raphael and ancient Rome, while pointing forward to Ingres, Cézanne, the Cubists, and Picasso.

"The work of the great French painter Nicolas Poussin (15941665) is most often associated with classically inspired settings and figures depicting solemn scenes from mythology or the Bible. Yet he also created some of the most influential landscapes in Western art, endowing them with a poetic quality that has been admired by artists as different as Constable, Turner, and Ce;zanne. As the British critic William Hazlitt noted in 1844, 'This great and learned man might be said to see nature through the glass of time'. This beautiful catalogue presents the first in-depth examination of Poussin's landscapes. Featured here are more than 40 paintings, ranging from the artist's early Venetian-inspired pastorals to his grandly structured and austere works, designed as metaphors or allegories for the processes of nature. Also included are approximately 60 drawings and essays by internationally renowned scholars who examine the painter's visual, literary, and philosophical influences as well as his relationships with his patrons and his place in the art-historical canon."--Publisher description.

Publication coincides with the 400th anniversary of the artist's birth and a forthcoming exhibition

A French painter and draughtsman, active in Italy, Nicolas Poussin's supreme achievement as an artist lies in his unrivalled marriage of dramatic narratives and expressions of human passions within a formal harmony of design. Focused on the search for a point of equilibrium and synthesis between the forces of the Classical and the Baroque, Poussin's work embodied the critical artistic debate in Rome during the 1630s. This fully illustrated title explores Poussin's life and work, including an analysis of his working methods and technique, and delves into both his own writings and the critical reception of his work. With the addition of an extensive bibliography, discover the grandeur of Poussin's designs with Grove Art Essentials.

Includes section: Notes and reviews.

The works have been selected by Pierre Rosenberg, Director of the Louvre, who contributes a distinguished essay to this catalogue, and by Neil MacGregor, Director of the National Gallery in London.