The Sacrifice of Isaac
Guillaume Courtois (Saint-Hippolyte 1628 - Rome 1679)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
1660 - 1669
Materials
Oil on canvas
Measurements
1334 x 965 mm (52 1/2 x 38 in)
Place of origin
Rome
Order this imageCollection
Hinton Ampner, Hampshire
NT 1530092
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, The Sacrifice of Isaac by Guillaume Courtois (Saint-Hippolyte 1628 - Rome 1679), 1660s. Full-length figure of Abraham, centre, his left hand pressing the head of a kneeling loin-clothed Isaac, his upraised right hand holding a dagger, a winged angel above restraining him, a ram in a thicket to right. Cortese was a pupil of Pietro da Cortona and, although a Burgundian, really called Guillaume Courtois, so thoroughly assimilated the Italian Baroque in Rome, where he spent the whole of his active career, that even his name was Italianised. This painting was executed about the same time as the Martydom of Saint Andrew in S. Andrea al Quirinale, Rome. His brother, Jacques or Giacomo, who was in Rome with him, and became a Jesuit and a celebrated painter of battle pieces, is also known as 'Il Borgonone'. A drawing for Abraham's head is in the collection of the Earl of Leicester at Holkham Hall (portfolio III, 9).
Provenance
Purchased by Ralph Stawell Dutton (1898-1985), 8th and last Lord Sherborne, from Colnaghi (3 July 1963; £1,550); bequeathed to the National Trust by Ralph Stawell Dutton, with the rest of the collections, house, gardens and estate of Hinton Ampner.
Credit line
Hinton Ampner, The Ralph Dutton Collection (National Trust)
Makers and roles
Guillaume Courtois (Saint-Hippolyte 1628 - Rome 1679) , artist