AIX-EN-PROVENCE.- Keen art lovers since the 16th century, the Princely Family of Liechtenstein recently presented the best of their collections in Japan (Tokyo, Kochi, Kyoto), Singapore, China (Beijing, Shanghai), Taiwan (Taipei), and Moscow.

In the autumn of 2015, the Caumont Centre d’Art in Aix-en-Provence will welcome the masterpieces of this collection as part of a remarkable exhibition.

The Princely Collections is currently one of the most important and extensive private collections of art. It is also one of the most vibrant: the reigning prince, Hans-Adam II von und zu Liechtenstein, implements a policy of regular acquisitions.

The selection of artworks presented at the Caumont Centre d’Art provides an insight into the tastes of the Liechtenstein family, with some forty or so paintings and watercolours on display, ranging from the 16th to the 19th century.

The exhibition is prefaced by a presentation of the Princely family, introducing the founders of the collection to the main collectors of the present day. The exhibition also showcases numerous works by the Grand Masters from the Collections of the Prince of Liechtenstein, arranged in a themed and chronological layout.

THE COLLECTIONS OF THE PRINCE OF LIECHTENSTEIN
Art lovers and patrons since the 16th century, the Princes of Liechtenstein have amassed one of the largest private art collections in Europe.

Primarily dedicated to Western art, from the Renaissance to the late 18th century, the Princely Collections include paintings (approximately 1,700), sculptures, drawings, engravings, furniture, books and precious objects. The collection was started in the 17th century, inspired by the ideals of princely patronage of the arts, characteristic of the Baroque period, ideals which the family continue to promote today.

If the majority of the Princely Collections is to be found in Vaduz, a selection is nevertheless accessible to the public in some of the other family residences, notably in Vienna: the Liechtenstein City Palace (with its neoclassical and Biedermeier style) and the Liechtenstein Garden Palace (with its Renaissance and Baroque influences).

THE GRAND GALLERY OF THE 16TH CENTURY
With the exception of the Italian artworks, the quasi totality of the 16th-century paintings displayed in this room are representative of the most significant and recent acquisitions by Prince Hans-Adam II.

These include Renaissance paintings from Germany (The Tax Collectors by Massys, acquired in 2008, and Venus by Cranach, acquired in 2013), Flanders (Virgin and Child by Gossaert acquired in 2015), Holland (Saint Sebastian by Cornelisz. von Haarlem and Portrait of Alessandro Farnese by Mor, acquired in 2010 and 2015 respectively), and Spain (Portrait of Don Diego by Sánchez Coello, acquired in 2007).

The human figure is omnipresent in all thirteen paintings, attesting to the return to favour of the human figure in Renaissance art.

In painting, this triumphant advent of the individual may be seen in both the prevalence of the portrait and of nudes, as well as the large-scale representation of sacred, historical or mythological figures.

Focused on the physiognomic and psychological representation of an individual, the art of portraiture, in the Flemish and Italian traditions, comes in the form of intimate likenesses, three-quarter views (Raphael’s and Franciabigio’s Portrait of a Man and Portrait of a Lady by Bernardino da Cotignola), and ceremonial portraits, where the subjects are depicted standing (for example, the portrait of Alessandro Farnese by Antonis Mor).

Another aspect of Renaissance art is the prevalence of sacred figures, imbued with human attributes, and oftentimes depicted within an intimate or private setting, such as Jan Gossaert’s Virgin and Child. Also common were representations of the saints by Cranach the Elder and Cornelis Cornelisz. van Haarlem for example, or figures from the Old Testament (Cristofano Allori). These figures tended to dominate the entire composition.

RUBENS
The Princely Collections boast thirty-five signed works by Rubens—one of the largest ensembles of Rubens in the world. The oldest date from the early 17th century, while the most recent, the monumental Assumption of the Virgin Mary was painted by the Flemish master in 1637, three years before his death. The latter was acquired by Karl Eusebius I von Liechtenstein, who met the artist at the court of the Archduchess Isabella in Brussels in 1628. However it was Karl Eusebius’s son, Johann Adam Andreas I who amassed the majority of the Rubens collection, with the aid of the Forchondt brothers, merchants from Antwerp and Berlin.

Thanks to the latter, in 1693 he acquired the eight monumental canvases of the Decius Mus cycle (the name is in reference to the history of the Roman consul, Decius Mus), which at that time, had been attributed to Van Dyck, as well as Venus in Front of a Mirror (circa 1614). Furthermore, thanks to the assistance of Jan Peeter Bredael, another important Antwerp merchant, Johann Adam Andreas I acquired the monumental Mars and Rhea Silvia in 1710. He also succeeded in acquiring another jewel for the collection: Portrait of Clara Serena Rubens, at the age of five, as well as the double portrait of Albert and Nikolaus, the painter’s sons (circa 1626).

Several of the Rubens acquired by Johann Adam Andreas I would later leave the Liechtenstein Collection. However, these shortcomings were filled, in part, thanks to the acquisitions of Franz Josef II—the Modello of Mars and Rhea Silvia—and by Hans-Adam II— The Conversion of Saint Paul, Christ Triumphant over Sin and Death, sketches for The hunt of Meleager and Atalanta and Diana’s Hunt.

AN ECLECTIC TASTE
The paintings in this room, each with a strong narrative dimension, depicting objects, animals or figures, may be characterized by their eclecticism. In this, they can be said to illustrate the stylistic and iconographic evolution of European painting between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries, resulting in the advent of different pictorial genres. Alongside ‘high genre painting’ devoted to sacred and profane history, which continued to be the subject of numerous commissions, new subject matter presented itself, including landscapes, genre scenes and still lifes.

Particularly present in the Princely Collections, religious painting can be seen in all its stylistic and iconographic diversity. When Hans-Adam II acquired in 2008 The Finding of Moses by Francesco Solimena (circa 1690), his intention was to continue the tradition linking the Princely family to the Neapolitan painter who had painted a portrait of Josef Wenzel I when he visited the Imperial Court of Naples, in 1725. The Princes of Liechtenstein have always had a particular penchant for Classical antiquity and mythology. Indeed, it was during a trip to Rome in 1748 that Josef Wenzel I commissioned Batoni’s Venus Presenting Aeneas with Armour forged by Vulcan and Hercules at the Crossroads for his Viennese palace on the Herrengasse.

THE GOLDEN AGE OF DUTCH AND FLEMISH PAINTING
Among the jewels of the Princely Collections can be seen a remarkable series of Flemish and Dutch paintings dating from the 17th century. Some are representative of the Flemish Baroque style—beginning with two of the most prestigious collaborators of Rubens, Frans Snyders and Anthonis van Dyck, while others evoke the austere context experienced by many of the great Dutch Masters working in the Northern Netherlands, including Rembrandt and Frans Hals. Talented portraitists, capable of adding a psychological dimension to a face, the two latter artists revolutionized the genre of portraiture, whether individual or collective, which at that time was increasingly popular.

In the second half of the century, in Amsterdam, Rembrandt also provided history painting with a new lease of life, both religious and secular (historical and mythological).

From the outset, Dutch and Flemish painting of the Golden Age was one of the preferred domains of the Liechtenstein family, advised in this matter by veritable experts, such as Berlin art historian, Wilhelm von Bode, during the reign of Johann II.

LANDSCAPES AND STILL LIFES
Paintings of landscapes and still lifes emerged in the 16th century in northern Europe, but became widespread in the following century. Despite being classified as ‘minor genres’, they proved to be extremely popular with art lovers. The Liechtenstein family were no exception and collected both the Great Masters, such as Jan Davidszoon de Heem whose still lifes were already being sold at astronomical prices during his lifetime, as well as rarer names such as the Dutch painter of flowers, Jan van Huysum. The princes’ abiding interest in antiquity was centred on the theme of Arcadia as evidenced in the neoclassical-style landscapes painted by Giovanni Paolo Panini, Claude Joseph Vernet and Hubert Robert. First appearing in the 17th century, the taste for urban landscapes known as ‘vedute’ continued to gain in popularity during the 18th century. The imaginary landscapes of Hubert Robert combined nature and the lyricism of ruins, a subject matter specific to the Enlightenment, in works such as Capriccio with the Pantheon and the Porto di Ripetta (1761), a prototype of the reception piece that would allow him to enter the Académie Royale in 1766.

Jan Davidszoon de Heem ranks high amongst the Dutch and Flemish painters specializing in still lifes, a genre imbued with a poetic, even metaphysical dimension.

THE PRINCELY RESIDENCES
The Princes of Liechtenstein are the owners of numerous properties, each built in a different architectural style. Some of these have been beautifully depicted in some remarkable gouaches and watercolours, which provide the viewer with an insight into the princes’ elegant taste in decor. At the request of Johann I Ferdinand Runk, a gouache series of thirty views of the Liechtenstein family properties was painted between 1813 and 1824, including views of the unfinished Baroque chateau in Plumlov, the facade of the Garden Palace in Rossau, and the colonnades of Feldsberg and Adamsthal. Furthermore, in the 1830s, Josef Höger executed exterior views of Liechtenstein Fortress near Mödling, the ‘Frontier Chateau’ and of the Palais Rasumofsky in Vienna. During the reign of Alois II, Rudolf von Alt executed several watercolours of the Liechtenstein properties in Moravia and Vienna. He reproduced the intimate atmosphere of various Viennese princely mansions, at Eisgrub and Maria Enzersdorf, with their furniture and works of art in situ. The views of the living rooms, bedrooms, libraries and offices are as much an illustration of the interior design, as they are a testimony to the taste and art de vivre of the various members of the Princely family.