{"secondaryobjectnumber":null,"periodterms":[],"creditline":"Museum purchase, John Maclean Magie, Class of 1892, and Gertrude Magie Fund","caption":"Charles Swagers (French, 1792–after 1849), The Tomb of Maria Christina of Austria, by Antonio Canova, 1820s. Oil on canvas; 73 × 61.5 cm, 90.2 × 79.7 × 7.6 cm (frame). Museum purchase, John Maclean Magie, Class of 1892, and Gertrude Magie Fund (y1970-12)","cultureterms":[{"id":2031609,"culture":"French"}],"type":"artobject","dimensionsproposed":"","terms":[{"id":2053145,"term":"oil paintings","aatid":300033799,"termtype":"Classification"},{"id":2031609,"term":"French","aatid":300111188,"termtype":"Culture"},{"id":2080538,"term":"pyramids (tombs or platforms)","aatid":300004838,"termtype":"Subject"},{"id":2055657,"term":"figures (representations)","aatid":300189808,"termtype":"Subject"},{"id":2099836,"term":"mourning","aatid":300238450,"termtype":"Subject"},{"id":2095232,"term":"personification","aatid":300055905,"termtype":"Subject"},{"id":2052977,"term":"paintings","aatid":300033618,"termtype":"Classification"},{"id":2171344,"term":"canvas","aatid":null,"termtype":"Materials"},{"id":2167780,"term":"oil paint","aatid":300015050,"termtype":"Materials"}],"geography":[],"dimensionelements":[{"element":"frame","type":"Height","units":"centimeters","dimension":"90.16"},{"element":"frame","type":"Width","units":"centimeters","dimension":"79.69"},{"element":"frame","type":"Depth","units":"centimeters","dimension":"7.61"},{"element":"Overall","type":"Height","units":"centimeters","dimension":"73.00"},{"element":"Overall","type":"Width","units":"centimeters","dimension":"61.50"}],"markings":null,"accessionyear":"1970-01-01","newaccession":0,"makers":[{"id":2650,"displayname":"Charles Swagers","displaydate":"French, 1792–after 1849","datebegin":1792,"dateend":1854,"prefix":null,"suffix":null,"role":"Artist","displaymaker":"Charles Swagers, French, 1792–after 1849","displayorder":1}],"datecomputed":1824,"signed":"Signed and dated to right of pyramid: C. Swagers/182[?]","restrictions":null,"classification":"Paintings","packages":[{"packageid":210962,"name":"Z_JS European On View 10 years"},{"packageid":182999,"name":"image_descriptions_eps_painitings"},{"packageid":152533,"name":"web_frenchpaintings"},{"packageid":246533,"name":"EPS Provenance Nazi-era gaps"},{"packageid":206417,"name":"image_descriptions_top250"},{"packageid":181959,"name":"web_2020_K4-6"},{"packageid":197269,"name":"web_highlights -revised 2021"},{"packageid":123,"name":"Web_Provenance"},{"packageid":276252,"name":"Nazi Era Sept 2025 list for web"},{"packageid":210960,"name":"Z_JS European Anchors"},{"packageid":207234,"name":"SAB_Gala2021"}],"catalograisonne":null,"classifications":[{"id":2052977,"classification":"paintings"},{"id":2053145,"classification":"oil paintings"}],"exhibitions":[],"cultures":[],"primaryimage":["https://media.artmuseum.princeton.edu/iiif/3/collection/PUAM21GA41161"],"displaytitle":"The Tomb of Maria Christina of Austria, by Antonio Canova","displayculture":null,"displaymaker":"Charles Swagers, French, 1792–after 1849","captionhtml":"Charles Swagers (French, 1792–after 1849), The Tomb of Maria Christina of Austria, by Antonio Canova, 1820s. Oil on canvas; 73 × 61.5 cm, 90.2 × 79.7 × 7.6 cm (frame). Museum purchase, John Maclean Magie, Class of 1892, and Gertrude Magie Fund (y1970-12)","displaydate":"1820s","medium":"Oil on canvas","media":[{"id":232295,"uri":"https://media.artmuseum.princeton.edu/iiif/3/collection/PUAM21GA41161","isprimary":1,"rank":1,"mediatypeid":1,"mediaviewtype":"(not assigned)","restrictions":null,"caption":"PUAM Photo"}],"displayperiod":null,"extended_content":false,"campuscollections":"false","bibliography":[{"boilertext":"The age of neo-classicism: [catalogue of] the fourteenth exhibition of the Council of Europe [held at] the Royal Academy and the Victoria & Albert Museum, (London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1972).","citation":"The age of neo-classicism: [catalogue of] the fourteenth exhibition of the Council of Europe [held at] the Royal Academy and the Victoria & Albert Museum, (London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1972)., no. 245","date":1972,"id":4782,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/624417"},{"boilertext":"Carlo Alberto Petrucci, Catalogo generale delle stampe tratte dai rami incisi posseduti dalla Calcografia nazionale, (Roma: La Libreria dello Stato, 1953).","citation":"Carlo Alberto Petrucci, Catalogo generale delle stampe tratte dai rami incisi posseduti dalla Calcografia nazionale, (Roma: La Libreria dello Stato, 1953)., no. 1299","date":1953,"id":4783,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/1451658"},{"boilertext":"Horst Woldemar Janson, History of art: a survey of the major visual arts from the dawn of history to the present day, (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1977).","citation":"Horst Woldemar Janson, History of art: a survey of the major visual arts from the dawn of history to the present day, (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1977)., p. 592, fig. 758","date":1977,"id":4784,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/2794291"},{"boilertext":"Mark Girouard, \"Neo-Classicism: from the revolutionary to the fancy dress\", Architectural review 152, no. 907 (Sept. 1, 1972): p. 169-172.","citation":"Mark Girouard, \"Neo-Classicism: from the revolutionary to the fancy dress\", Architectural review 152, no. 907 (Sept. 1, 1972): p. 169-172., p. 174, fig. 11","date":1972,"id":4785,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/38435978"},{"boilertext":"Explication des ouvrages de peinture, sculpture, architecture, gravure, et lithographie des artistes vivans: exposés au Musée royal le 1er mars 1833, (Paris: Musee Royal du Luxembourg, 1833)","citation":"Explication des ouvrages de peinture, sculpture, architecture, gravure, et lithographie des artistes vivans: exposés au Musée royal le 1er mars 1833, (Paris: Musee Royal du Luxembourg, 1833), p. 163","date":1833,"id":4786,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/123535830"},{"boilertext":"Dictionnaire générale des artistes de l'école française, depuis l'origine des arts du dessin jusqu'à nos jours, (Paris: Librairie Renouard, 1882).","citation":"Dictionnaire générale des artistes de l'école française, depuis l'origine des arts du dessin jusqu'à nos jours, (Paris: Librairie Renouard, 1882)., Vol. 2: p. 536","date":1882,"id":4787,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/739408556"},{"boilertext":"Lorenz Eitner, \"\"The age of neo-classicism\": I. paintings and sculpture at the Royal Academy\", Burlington magazine 114, no. 836 (Nov. 1972): p. 743-749.","citation":"Lorenz Eitner, \"\"The age of neo-classicism\": I. paintings and sculpture at the Royal Academy\", Burlington magazine 114, no. 836 (Nov. 1972): p. 743-749., fig. 8","date":1972,"id":4788,"uri":"https://www.jstor.org/stable/877177"},{"boilertext":"Princeton University Art Museum: Handbook of the Collections (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Art Museum, 2013)","citation":"Princeton University Art Museum: Handbook of the Collections (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Art Museum, 2013), p. 211","date":2013,"id":1994,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/865020505"},{"boilertext":"\"Acquisitions 1970\", Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 30, no. 1 (1971): p. 22-30.","citation":"\"Acquisitions 1970\", Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 30, no. 1 (1971): p. 22-30., p. 23","date":1971,"id":3440,"uri":"https://www.jstor.org/stable/3774539"}],"nowebuse":"False","periods":[],"department":"European Painting and Sculpture ","attribute_groups":[{"id":2199321,"term":"European Art","termtype":"Collecting Area"},{"id":2199338,"term":"Nazi-era gaps","termtype":"Provenance & Cultural Heritage"}],"daterange":"A.D. 1800-1850","dateend":1829,"depicted":[],"titles":[{"title":"The Tomb of Maria Christina of Austria, by Antonio Canova","titletype":"Primary Title","displayorder":1}],"hasimage":"true","creditlinerepro":"","objectnumber":"y1970-12","inscribed":null,"texts":[{"texttype":"Online","textpurpose":"Provenance","textentryhtml":"Art market, London (around 1960s); George Dix, New York (1970; sold to the Princeton University Art Museum).","remarks":"Migrated from 9.35 12/2013"},{"texttype":"Online","textpurpose":"Handbook Entry","textentryhtml":"\r\nThis painting was submitted to the Paris Salon of 1833 by the little-known painter Charles Swagers. The cenotaph depicted here stands in the Augustinian Church in Vienna; commissioned by Duke Albert of Sachsen-Teschen to commemorate his wife, who died in 1798, it was created by Antonio Canova (1757–1822), the foremost Neoclassical sculptor of the age. Like the monument Canova had designed earlier to honor Titian, in Venice, it was unprecedented for its synthesis of an ancient structure — based on the Pyramid of Cestius in Rome — and a modern interpretation of a figural tomb. The deceased appears only in a portrait medallion, and Christian imagery has been eliminated. The genius of death, the mourning lion, the figures representing the different ages of humankind: all suggest an eternity and a visual language that would have been as comprehensible to the ancients as they are to us.

","remarks":null},{"texttype":"Online","textpurpose":"Gallery Label","textentryhtml":"\r\n

Depicted here is the tomb that Albert of Saxe-Teschen commissioned from Canova for his wife, Maria Christina of Austria. The monument, in St. Augustine’s Church in Vienna, was completed in 1805. The painting differs from the tomb in its inscription, which reads \"MARIAE CHRISTINAE AVSTRIACAE/ ALBERTI SAXONIAE PRINCIPIS CONIVCI\" (To Maria Christina of Austria/ Wife of Albert, Prince of Saxony) instead of the original \"VXORI OPTIMAE /ALBERTVS\" (To the Best Wife/Albert). This change reflects the different intentions of the sculptor and the patron. Albert had envisioned the tomb as a traditional homage to the deceased, but Canova created a new kind of monument, in which the theme of death itself was emphasized: a cortege of people of different ages and genders enters the doorway of the royal tomb, which becomes a gateway for all of humanity to the world beyond.

\r\n

","remarks":"K4-6 Rotation June 2018 (see K4-6 Rotation March 2014, January 2016, January 2017 labels for similar text)"}],"datebegin":1820,"sortnumber":"1970 12y","published_date":"2026-02-11 10:24:54.700641","objectid":31509,"dimensions":"73 × 61.5 cm (28 3/4 × 24 3/16 in.)\r\nframe: 90.2 × 79.7 × 7.6 cm (35 1/2 × 31 3/8 × 3 in.)","on_view":false}