Philippe de Champaigne (1602-1674, circle of): Saint Augustine, oil on canvas, 17th C.

Work: 87 x 67,5 cm

Frame: 108,5 x 90,5 cm

The prime version of this work is part of the collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (link). The work offered differs from that version in a number of elements, where, for example, the books at the saint's feet have been omitted. A more remarkable difference, however, is that in the known version, Saint Augustine holds a burning heart in his hand (based on the frontispice of the book on Augustinus, which was pulished by Jansenius in 1640, link). In the version offered here, the heart has been replaced by a corpus. Bernard Dorival, expert on Philippe de Champaigne, writes about this in a letter dated 16 September 2003. His suggestion is that the work probably originated in a function of a more Jansenist context.

Ref.:

- A similar painting (100 x 80 cm) of Saint Augustine of the workshop of Philippe de Champaigne was sold in 2021 for €186.620 (link).