BOGUET, Nicolas-Didier

(b. 1755 Chantilly, d. 1839 Roma)

French painter and draughtsman, active in Italy. Sent to Paris at the age of 23 as a protégé of the Prince de Condé, he was admitted to the Académie on the recommendation of Augustin Pajou to study history painting. In 1783 he went to Rome, where he began to concentrate on landscape, spending the summer months outdoors in the Roman Campagna. These trips resulted in hundreds of drawings (Rome, Palazzo Farnesina), the best of which have been compared to those of Claude Lorrain.

In the 1790s Boguet painted views for European aristocrats staying in Rome, in particular Frederick Augustus Hervey, 4th Earl of Bristol, for whom he painted a View of Lake Albano (Musée de Grenoble) in 1795. The following year Boguet was introduced to Napoleon, who persuaded him to paint a number of works celebrating his Italian campaigns, including the Battle of Castiglione (Versailles, Château).

Arcadian Landscape

Nicolas-Didier Boguet was one of the leading French classical landscape artists working in Italy around the turn of the nineteenth century. Although he trained as a history painter, he established his reputation in Italy as a painter of landscapes.

This canvas depicts an Arcadian landscape with shepherds playing pipes, resting on the banks of a stream, with mountains beyond. It is from Boguet’s first Roman period (1789-1797), during which time he often included episodes from Roman history and mythology. Here, he illustrates a scene from Virgil’s fifth Eclogue in which two shepherds, Menalcus and Mopsus, stumble upon the tomb of Daphnis, a famed poet and Sicilian shepherd known for Bacchic revelry. The Latin inscription on the tomb is Virgil’s fifth Eclogue (V, 43-44).

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Arcadian Landscape (detail)

The Latin inscription found on the tomb reads: “Daphnis ego in silvis, hinc usque ad sidera notus/Formosi pecoris custos, formosior ipse” (Virgil, Eclogues, V, 43-44).

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View of Lake Nemi

Boguet traveled to Rome in 1783, and began concentrating on landscape painting. He spent his summers traveling and painting in the Italian countryside, He is primarily noted for his outdoor landscapes, but also produced portraits and scenes which included people.

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