# Allegory of Astronomy [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [LA HYRE, Laurent de]() - Date: 1601-1650 - Technique: Oil on canvas, 104 x 218 cm ## Commentary Although the Parisian painter La Hyre seems never to have travelled to Italy, he was well aware - through study at Fontainebleau and through the work of contemporary artists like Vouet, Poussin and Claude - of the achievements of the Italian Renaissance. He became a major exponent of a restrained and refined classical manner fashionable in the French capital. The sculptural clarity and weight of the figure in this allegorical painting, the measured regularity of the composition with its emphasis on horizontal and vertical lines, the even lighting and discrete local colour can all be contrasted with the sweeping movement, dramatic play of light, shade, textures and reflections in Baroque works by contemporaries like Rembrandt. ## Related artworks - [Abraham Sacrificing Isaac]() - [Allegory of Arithmetic]() - [Allegory of Geometry]() - [Allegory of Geometry]() - [Allegory of Grammar]() - [Allegory of Grammar]() - [Allegory of Music]() - [Allegory of the Regency]() - [Angelica and Medoro \(detail\)]() - [Angelica and Medoro]() - [Christ The Judge]() - [Cornelia Refusses the Crown of the Ptolomai]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()