PATEL, Pierre-Antoine
(b. 1648, Paris, d. 1707, Paris)

Biography

French painter, son of Pierre Patel. Like his father, he was independent of the Académie Royale, and on 23 July 1677 he was admitted into the Académie de Saint-Luc. About 50 paintings by him survive, as well as gouaches such as Landscape (Rome, Galleria Borghese) which are usually dated to the last 15 years of his life. He presumably learnt his skill as a painter from his father. Their canvases are often confused and at first sight are very similar. A Landscape with the Vision of St Eustace with very brown tonality is his first signed and dated work (1673; private collection). In 1699 he painted a series of 12 landscapes representing the months for the Jesuits' convent of the Maison Professe (now St Paul-St Louis), Paris. These were confiscated during the French Revolution, but nine have been rediscovered and are scattered in various museums, for example his Winter (Paris, Louvre), which has an element of fantasy also present in the later work Dawn (1705; Marseille, Musée des Beaux-Arts).