“A Great Clash of Figures”

Rubens’ The Fall of the Damned (1619–1621) has been widely acclaimed by critics since the end of the 17th century. However, few studies have focused on its “material effects,” their perception and critical reception. This article starts with the materiality of the damned body falling in hell, before exploring more theoretical and aesthetic aspects. The notion of grand fracas de figures (“great clash of figures”), inherited from Roger de Piles, marks the introduction into historiography of a vision of colour as constructing pictorial forms. Rubens’s brushwork and the fluidity of his material (Focillon) encourage to re-evaluate the stains, coloured masses, and effusions that put precise forms in crisis. The “rain of fire” (duc de Richelieu) and erupting volcano (Antoine Wiertz), compared to the materiality of painting, finally manifest the unexpected richness of matter in commentaries from the 17th to the 19th century.