The Conclusion of Peace, 10th August 1620 (The Medici Cycle), c.1621/25 by Peter Paul Rubens
Canvas Print - 13733-RPP

Wife of Henri IV, Marie de' Medici assumed the regency of the French kingdom after the sovereign's assassination in 1610. In 1621, she commissioned the Flemish painter Pieter Paul Rubens (whose fame had already spread beyond his homeland) to decorate two galleries in her Luxembourg palace, dedicated to Henri IV and herself respectively. The artist was invited to focus first on the second. Rubens sent the first sketches, and on 24 May 1623 he arrived in Paris with nine canvases begun in his Antwerp studio, which he would complete on the spot. The ensemble of twenty-four works in all (most of which came from under the artist's brush) was completed in May 1625. Various episodes from the life of Marie de' Medici are depicted. The paintings were taken to the Louvre and arranged in this gallery, which had been specially converted to receive them. In the Luxembourg Palace the light falling on them streamed from windows between them; in the Louvre the illumination was zenithal.

The gods and goddesses descended from Olympus at the moment of the Queen's birth and accompanied her throughout her life. They glorify the stellar moments of her reign or support her in the misfortunes and clashes she goes through. After coming into the world in Florence on 26 April 1573 (picture II), she learned to read in the presence of the god Apollo, under the watchful gaze of the three Graces (picture III). On 3 November 1600, Maria de' Medici arrived in Marseilles. France welcomes her (picture VI) before she heads to Lyon, where her marriage to Henri IV is solemnized (picture VII). After the birth of Louis XIII on 27 September 1601 (painting VIII), the artist depicts the death of Henri IV, the regency entrusted to the Queen (painting X), also her intoxication with the eminence (painting XV), without omitting the difficult hours during the escape from the castle of Blois in 1619 (painting XVII).

Rubens puts all his imagination and gift at the service of the ruler and constructs the ideal, triumphant image of the ruling woman, of her role in history, of her greatness. The compositions - now dynamic, now static - draw and draw the eye into a movement that never seems to cease. The light in these sumptuous, monumental canvases seems unreal. It brings out the sweep and completeness of the figures, the beauty of the naked bodies, the lavishness of the red and gold. A powerful breath fills each of the scenes and transforms the ensemble into one of the masterpieces of Baroque art.