GASCAR, Henri

French painter. He was perhaps the son of Pierre Gascar, an obscure painter and sculptor. In 1659 he made his first journey to Rome. He had probably returned to Paris by 1667, although he may have been in the Netherlands that year when he executed his fine portraitGLOSSARYThe Roman portrait bust survived in the form of life-sized reliquaries of saints, but it was in 15th century Florence that the individual features and character of a contemporary sitter were accurately recorded by sculptors such as Donatello, Desiderio da Settignano, Mino da Fiesole and the Rossellino. A similar degree of realism occurs in 15th century tomb sculpture. The equestrian portrait, based on antique statues such as the Marcus Aurelius monument (Rome, Campidoglio), was revived in the 14th century. Two examples in fresco are Simone Martini's Guidoriccio (c. 1328; Siena, Palazzo Pubblico) and the posthumous portrait of Sir John Hawkwood (1436; Florence, Cathedral) by Uccello, which gives the illusion of a 3-dimensional statue seen from below. The Venetian Republic ordered imposing monuments from Donatello (1447; Gattarnelata, Padua) and Verrocchio (14799; Colleoni, Venice), whilst other statesmen ordered their own images to be erected in public places, directly relating themselves to the military heroes of ancient Rome. Another form of political portraiture derived from antiquity was the commemorative portrait medal designed by artists such as Pisanello. The carved or painted profile portrait became popular in the 1450s. The realism of the clear, flattened image, painted under the influence of Flemish examples by the Pollaiuolo brothers, Piero della Francesca and Botticelli, was superseded by the three-quarter and frontal portrait, psychologically more complex, such as Leonardo's enigmatic Mona Lisa (Paris, Louvre) with her momentary smile or Andrea del Sarto's arresting Portrait of a Man (London, National Gallery). The 16th century portrait became generalized, Lotto's Andrea Odoni (1527; Royal Collection) being an idealized concept of a collector rather than an individual. Group portraits, decorating whole rooms, include the narrative scenes of the Gonzaga court painted by Mantegna (completed 1474; Mantua, Palazzo Ducale) and the elaborate schemes commissioned by the Farnese family in Rome from Vasari (1546; Palazzo della Cancelleria) and Salviati (after 1553; Palazzo Farnese). Portraits were also incorporated into religious narratives, as in Ghirlandaio's fresco cycle painted for Giovanni Tornabuoni in S. Maria Novella, Florence (1486-90). of Nicolas Delafond (St Petersburg, Hermitage), a journalist from Amsterdam. The informality of the pose and the simplicity of the sitter's expression are reminiscent of contemporary Dutch portraits by such painters as Jacob Gerritsz. Cuyp and Ferdinand Bol, but the elegance of gesture and the extremely refined treatment of drapery are entirely French.

In 1672 Gascar's morceau de réception, a portrait of Louis de Bourbon, the Grand Dauphin (untraced), was rejected by the Académie Royale, a setback that may have been the cause of his departure for England in 1674. In London he worked at the court of Charles II, painting the portrait of, among others, Louise Renée de Penancoet de Kéroualle, Duchess of Portsmouth (Goodwood House, W. Sussex), with whom he found particular favour. During this period he also painted the double portrait of Lord Lisle and Dorothy Sidney, Children of the 3rd Earl of Leicester (Althorp House, Northants), which shows the influence of both Pierre Mignard and Peter Lely. His allegorical portrait of the Duchess of Grafton (Providence, RI, Brown University, Bell GalleryGLOSSARYan upper story, similar to a tribune, running along the side of a building and open on one side to the interior; in a church (basilica) above the side aisles, over the ambulatory (central-plan building) and also over the west end. The gallery was used to keep certain groups of worshippers apart (women, noblemen).), on the other hand, seems to reveal the influence of Willem Wissing (c. 1656-1687). His most astonishing work in the English context is the full-length portrait of James, Duke of York, as Lord High Admiral (London, National Maritime Museum). The Duke (later James II) is presented in Roman armour in a manner reminiscent of images of Louis XIV, and the colouring has a curious metallic tonality.

Some time before 1680 he returned to Paris. He was elected a member of the Académie Royale there on 26 October 1680. He subsequently went to Rome, where he enjoyed a high reputation, and died there on 1 January 1701, aged 66.