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Christ and the Samaritan Woman
Sébastien Bourdon (French, 1616–1671)
1664–69
Medium/Technique
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
144.5 x 199.1 cm (56 7/8 x 78 3/8 in.)
Credit Line
Juliana Cheney Edwards Collection
Accession Number68.23
CollectionsEurope
ClassificationsPaintings
Bourdon, one of the founders of the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in France, employed a number of devices to link this painting and its companion, Rebecca and Eleazar (MFA object no. 68.24). Each is centered around a well and consists of many figures arranged in a band across the foreground; when hung together, the pair of paintings is framed at the outer edges by women carrying jugs of water on their heads. The main characters are set apart by the gestures of the other figures toward them and, somewhat unusually, by the quiet colors of their dress in contrast to the bright costumes of the others.
ProvenanceAbout 1664-1669, painted for the abbé de Saint-Georges (probably Claude de Saint Georges, b. 1634 - d. 1714), Paris. Louis-François, prince de Conti (b. 1717 - d. 1776), Paris; May 16, 1777, posthumous Conti sale, Muzier and Rémy, Paris, lot 2087. Private collection, Paris. By 1962, Wildenstein and Co., Paris, London, and New York [see note 1]; 1968, sold by Wildenstein to the MFA. (Accession Date: February 7, 1968)
NOTES:
[1] Included in the exhibition "Religious Themes in Painting from the 14th Century Onwards," Wildenstein & Co., London, March 16-May 5, 1962, no. 39.
NOTES:
[1] Included in the exhibition "Religious Themes in Painting from the 14th Century Onwards," Wildenstein & Co., London, March 16-May 5, 1962, no. 39.