Few documents have survived relating to Antoine-Pierre Mongin's life, and one can only attempt its reconstruction by interpreting the works that have survived. He studied at the London Royal Academy of Arts from 1782 to 1785 and exhibited regularly at the Paris Salon between 1791 and 1824. Mongin painted many subjects-rural and urban landscapes, scenes of military life, genre scenes and those inspired by literature. He also narrated subjects from French history ranging from Joan of Arc to Napoleon.1 Almost all his works that have appeared at auction since 1920 are gouaches, and only a half-dozen of his paintings have been recorded.2 Since the 1975 exhibition French Painting 1774-1830: The Age of Revolution, publications have brought to light additional information about him. A book, published in 1977 about Godefroy Engelmann, one of the initiators of lithography in France, points out the fundamental role that Mongin played in Engelmann's establishment in Paris in 1816.3 Mongin, who knew Paris's artistic milieu, had propagated lithography even before Engelmann arrived. He captured the interest of writer and theoretician Quatremère de Quincy, but especially of the artists Bertin (q.v.), Girodet (q.v.), and Carle Vernet (1758-1836). Bernard Jacqué, curator of the Musée de l'Impression sur Étoffes in Mulhouse, recently researched another facet of Mongin's artistic talent: he designed wallpaper for Jean Zuber & Compagnie in 1802.4 His panoramic landscapes established a new fashion, and designs such as the Gardens of France of 1821 were still being printed in the late 1840s.5
1. Robert Rosenblum, French Painting 1774-1830: The Age of Revolution, exh. cat., Paris/Detroit/New York (1975), 553.
2. Ibid., 553.
3. Michel Melot, review of Léon Lang's book, Godefroy Engelmann imprimeur-lithographe: Les incunables, 1814-1817 (Colmar, France, 1977), in "Les premières lithographies françaises," Nouvelles de l'estampe no. 34-35 (July-October 1977).
4. Bernard Jacqué, Le papier peint, décor d'illusion (Barembach, France, 1987).
5. London sale, Christie's (3 July 1990), lot 129, p. 143.
