The sense of hearing

Mercier, Philippe (1689-1760)


Item type:
painting
Date of creation:
1739-1751
Height:
61.6 cm  (24 1/4 in.)
Width:
75.0 cm  (29 1/2 in.)
Signed low left: P.M.
Technique / Medium:
oil on canvas
Place of creation:
York

Additional titles

Allegories of the senses

    Item location

  • Private collectionLast known location is Sotheby's, New York. Sale N08610, New York, 28th January 2010, lot. 329 (with the allegories of the other senses).

Description

The center of the painting is occupied by a young woman at the harpsichord and all the attention is drawn to her because of two main reasons: she is looking at the observer and she is depicted at the center of a square drawn ideally from all the musical instruments surrounding her: the flute, the violin, the cello and the keyboard of the harpsichord. She is the only one who can easily read from the music stand on her instrument, but she is engaging the viewer with her sight, and therefore she leaves all her companions in the struggle to read the score. The whole composition therefore looks a bit awkward. By placing the women in this way the painter needed to put the cello in a strange position because otherwise the violin in the back could not be visible, and the whole representation would have looked a bit unbalanced.

Iconclass

31A32
hearing, listening (one of the five senses)

Instruments [MIMO Code] (notes)

Transverse flute [4093]
Violoncello [3582]
Violin [3573]
Harpsichord [2251]

Musical works

illegible music notation
The music book is opened on the music stand of the harpsichord, hence exclusively disclosed to the sight of the musicians represented.

RIdIM images


Image URLs

image link 1
Sotheby's catalogue, second painting from the top.
image link 2
RKD Images database

Bibliographic references

Ingamells, John and Robert Raines. "A catalogue of the paintings, drawings and etchings of Philip Mercier", Walpole Society 46 (1976-78) 63, nos. 269-273.

Taylor, Basil. Painting in England, 1700-1850: Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon (Richmond, Va., 1963) vol. I, 107-108.

Ingamells, John and Robert Raines. Philip Mercier, 1699-1760: An exhibition of paintings and engravings, York and Iveagh Bequest, Kenwood (London: Paul Mellon Foundation for British Art, 1969) 47.

Notes

Mercier painted this exact scene at least twice; a slightly different version is at the Yale Center for British Art (RIdIM item 6238).

RIdIM record id

3133