Paul Mantes - Broken Diane - 20th Century

Paul Mantes was second Grand Prix de Rome in 1944, professor at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris, architect, copyist approved by the Louvre and Orsay. This character accumulates all the prizes, all the know-how, then turns at the end of his career to his passion for painting. His compositions are surrealist, borrowing from his predecessors such as Dali, but also creating some women reminding us of the curves of Botticelli, a drowned martyr by Delaroche, or his series of "Silence" evoking the Salvadore Mundi. His environments giving the feeling of a deep void are embellished with elements hooking us to his reality. His immense artistic culture, and his profession as an architect, some compasses, sections of walls cut into diamonds, spheres, Gothic rosettes are visible in his compositions.

The subject treated here is a "Broken Diana". Unlike earlier representations by Poussin, Boucher, Rubens, she is not victorious, and the hunting scene is not to her advantage, she does not lead the fight since she seems to have lost. The base of the statue is upside down, her head is detached from the rest of the bust, her wooden bow broken. The moon-shaped tiara tells us about the identity of the goddess of the night. But in what seemed like a temple with ancient architecture, we see in the background that other stones have come loose. She may sink, the place seems abandoned, the reflection of a proud, upright stag in the background on the right seems to tell us that he has freed himself and is taking a last look at his protector. The flowering water lilies swallow Diana, she is no longer an omnipotent goddess, nature is reclaiming its rights.

Provenance: Estate sale, Atelier Paul MANTES (1921-2004), DROUOT "Ader", Tuesday March 20, 2012.