112 - Louis François CASSAS (Azay-le-Ferron 1756 - Versailles 1827)

Louis François CASSAS (Azay-le-Ferron 1756 - Versailles 1827) View of Caramania in Lycia: monks and travelers in a mountainous landscape near a sarcophagus Watercolor, pen and brown ink, over black pencil lines 67 x 103 cm Signed lower right Restored missing parts top right and top left, small stains Cassas accompanied the Comte de Choiseul to Constantinople and spent four years traveling through the Near East and Asia Minor, cataloguing all the classic sites. The most important sites of this long journey were engraved in the work "Voyage pittoresque de la Syrie, de la Phénicie, de la Palestine, et de la Basse Egypte, Paris 1799, 3 volumes, with 30 plate deliveries".) Use of the same motif, an ancient tomb, can be seen on a watercolor that was presented at the "Louis François Cassas" Exhibition in Tours in 1994 (see: exhibition catalog, Tours, Nov.1994, January 1995, and Cologne, April-June 1994, Mainz am Rhein, cat. no. 80, p.139, repr.).