catalog text
PINCKNEY MARCIUS-SIMONS
United States, 1865/67-1909
"Apotheosis"
Oil on canvas | signed lower right "P. MarciuSimons"
Item # 109SXP24A
A brilliant scene of Apotheosis from Richard Wagner's epic opera "The Nibelungen Ring", the painting is executed in oil on canvas and is signed lower right "P MarciuSimons" [conjoined S]. The reverse of the work shows an old inventory label from Newman Galleries where it was a part of their collection as no. 921 as well as a museum loan label for the Pennsylvania Museum of Art, noting its lender as McClees Galleries on behalf of Herbert Clark.
PINCKNEY MARCIUS-SIMONS
Little is known about the life of Pinckney Marcius-Simons and there is some disagreement among scholars on his date of birth, be it in 1865 or 1867. He was born in New York, but spent the majority of his life in Europe from a very young age. His childhood was spent in Spain, Italy and France where he studied at the Vaugirard College in Paris under the genre painter Jehan Georges Vibert (French, 1840-1902).
His early oeuvre was heavily influenced by Vibert, producing a large body of brilliantly colored genre and historical paintings, exhibiting these at the 1882 Paris Salon and at the Societe Nationale des Beaux Arts Salon from 1891-1894. Internationally active almost from the beginning, he showed his work at exhibitions in New York, Chicago and Boston starting as early as 1890 and began exhibiting at the Royal Academy in London in 1891 where he continued to exhibit throughout the rest of his career.
These early works were exceedingly competent and were moderately well-received by the critics, but his career crystalized when he turned his interest to French Symbolism and fell under the poetic and idealistic influence of the brilliant paintings of Joseph Mallord William Turner R.A. (England, 1775-1851). Here his palette and landscape were entirely set free from the academic norms of realism and he began to employ the deeper reserves of his imagination. His brush-work becomes feverish while light and motion become foundational to his canvas, these produced with brilliant colors and stunning complexity.
Fascinated by Richard Wagner's music, Marcius-Simons painted an entire series surrounding the cycle of "The Nibelungen Ring", his passion for the subject-matter taking him as far as the Wagner Theater in Bayreuth, Germany where he personally worked to design sets. Here he painted one of his most important works in 1908, not a singular painting on canvas but rather a collection of images illustrating from edge to edge each page and cover of an altered French edition of Paul Meurice's 1886 translation of "A Midsummer Night’s Dream".
Among his many important patrons was President Theodore Roosevelt who was a passionate collector of his work, purchasing four paintings that are still on view at his home in Oyster Bay, New York.
Marcius-Simons died in Bayreuth in 1909.
Artist Listings & Bibliography:
- E. Bénézit Dictionary of Artists, Vol. IX, Gründ, 2006, p. 237-238
Measurements: 46 3/4" H x 25 7/8" W [canvas]; 53 3/4" H x 32 7/8" W x 1 5/8" D [frame]
Condition Report: Wax-lined linen. Original stretchers and all original keys. Frame appears to be of the same date or at least of the same period. Light craquelure to the surface throughout with no losses. Paint layer in excellent condition with no evidence of inpainting. Our conservator treatment consisted of removing the yellowed varnish, cleaning with a wax emulsion and resealing the painting surface by applying a traditional damar varnish. Presents in excellent original condition. Frame with gilt losses and chips as expected. UV examination reveals no restoration or observed inpainting.