PIERRE SUBLEYRAS
Uzès 1699 - Rome 1749

The Pack Saddle (le Bat)

Oil On Copper: 30 x 23 cm (12.50 x 9.58 in)

Provenance: Paris, Drouot, 3 Dec 1985, as "attributed to Subleyras"

The Pack Saddle is the tale of a suspicious husband who believes himself a cuckold. To protect his wife's chastity he painted an image of an ass over her pudenda. While he is away, his friend, another artist, makes lover to her and erases the image. Before doing so, however, he had carefully copied it onto a piece of paper seen lying on the floor. The lover then repainted the image, but added a "pack saddle" (hence the title of the tale by la Fontaine). The husband, on returning, notes the change and the consequent proof of his wife's adultery. A variant of the painting exists in the Hermitage.