167 - Narcisse Virgile DIAZ DE LA PEÑA (1807–1876)

Narcisse Virgile DIAZ DE LA PEÑA (1807–1876) The Spell Oil on heavy cardboard 26.5 x 40.5 cm With frame: 52.5 x 66 cm This work will be included in the supplement to the catalog raisonné of the paintings by Narcisse Virgile Diaz de la Peña (1807–1876), currently being prepared by Rolande Miquel and Michael T. Klaa. Commentary by expert Mr. Klaa: This painting echoes Diaz’s composition exhibited at the 1844 Salon on the theme of witches and other servants of the Devil. Born of the medieval imagination, this theme was revisited in the painting and literature of the Romantic movement. Théophile Thoré (1807–1869) praises it in his booklet, *Le salon de 1844*. “The fourth subject exhibited by Mr. Diaz, *Le Maléfice*, strikes us as the most original and the most complete of his paintings. (…) In the midst of a fantastical landscape, a young girl, fresh and radiant, walks straight ahead at random, no doubt intoxicated by the scents of the air and the trees. At her side, one of the witches from *Macbeth*, or Mephistopheles disguised as an old woman, whispers some treacherous advice into her ear. The young girl, however, anxious and dreamy, continues on her way, listening to her companion’s enticements (…). It is a charming subject often depicted by Italian painters, who have portrayed it many times under the motif of Hercules between Vice and Virtue. Modern masters have called her Marguerite, following Goethe. “The symbol is far more touching and true in the person of a woman” (pp. 36–38 of the libretto). In the *Revue des deux Mondes*, Louis Peisse (1803–1880) sets the scene during “a journey to or from the Sabbath” (vol. 6, 1844). Diaz repeated this composition with equal success throughout his career to meet the demand of dealers and collectors. Several variations now hang on the walls of numerous museums. This theme is so highly regarded that another version, *Les Mauvais Conseils* (known as *Le Maléfice* or *La Sorcière*), which appeared in the posthumous sale of Diaz’s studio (January 1877, No. 24), before becoming part of the collections of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in Canada, was stolen from there in September 1972 and has never been recovered… (Taylor C. Noakes, Canadian Encyclopedia, February 7, 2022). Oil on cardboard, 10.2 x 15.7 in, with frame: 20.4 x 25.9 in