Reuniting Poussin’s Bacchanals Painted for Cardinal Richelieu through uantitative Canvas Weave Analysis

Art historical debate has percolated for more than half a century over the identity of the three Bacchanals (-) commissioned from Nicolas Poussin by Cardinal Richelieu for his chateau in Poitou, France. The subjects have been identified as the Triumphs of Pan, Bacchus, and Silenus, respectively. The success of this commission led to demand for the production of copies close in date to the originals, some of which are represented in major collections. There has been general consensus that Triumph of Pan (National Gallery of London, NG) was an original part of that commission. However, the status of Triumph of Bacchus (Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, -) as the original commissioned version has at various times been doubted, in spite of sharing a common provenance with Pan until . An incomplete early provenance and apparent stylistic discrepancies, particularly in relation to Pan, have caused serious doubts about the inclusion of Silenus (National Gallery of London, NG) among Richelieu’s original commission. It is today classified by the National Gallery as a painting “after Poussin”. In preparation for the Nelson-Atkins’ catalog of its French painting collection we sought to employ recent innovations in computerized “thread counting” for automated analysis of canvas weave variations to resolve the status of Bacchus. This approach has proven particularly powerful in demonstrating commonalities and distinctions between canvases of nominally identical average thread counts with art historical implications, as among the paintings of Vincent van Gogh (The BurlingtonMagazine, February ), court portraits by Velazquez (The BurlingtonMagazine, September ), and paintings by Johannes Vermeer (Metropolitan Museum Journal, ). Automated weave comparison held the potential to settle the questions surrounding Bacchus in the event that the artist had employed part of the same bolt of canvas for Pan. Existing National Gallery radiographs of Panwere digitized andmade available for our comparison with Bacchus *Corresponding author. [email protected]