Enfilade

William Chambers, Presentation drawing showing a perspective view of an unexecuted design for a Mausoleum
for Frederick, Prince of Wales, initialed and dated 1751, Pencil, pen and ink, and watercolour, 490 x 705 mm
(London: Sir John Soane’s Museum)

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Press release (17 August 2015) from Berlin’s Museum for Architectural Drawing:

In Pursuit of Antiquity: Drawings by the Giants of British Neo-Classicism
Auf den Spuren der Antike: Meisterzeichnungen des britischen Neoklassizismus
Sir John Soane’s Museum, London, 1 February  — 1 June 2008
Museum für Architekturzeichnung, Berlin, 3 October 2015 — 14 February 2016

Curated by Jeremy Musson

Important architectural drawings held by Sir John Soane’s Museum, one of the most significant collections of its kind in Great Britain, form a new temporary exhibition at the Museum for Architectural Drawing in Berlin. In Pursuit of Antiquity: Drawings from the Giants of British Neo-Classicism illustrates the ambition of leading British architects of the late 18th century who strove to create new architecture in the Classical tradition that could compete—in terms of public works, private houses, mausolea, interior detail and even furnishings—with the glories of the ancient world. Illustrating this central theme, some of the finest drawings and designs by Sir John Soane himself, Robert Adam, George Dance the Younger, Sir William Chambers, and James Wyatt are being shown for the first time in Germany.

In Pursuit of Antiquity is curated by architectural historian and author Jeremy Musson and was originally shown at Sir John Soane’s Museum in 2008. Musson’s selection from the Museum’s unrivalled collection includes an astonishingly detailed cutaway drawing of Holy Trinity Marylebone, one of Soane’s three neo-classical churches. Such designs are a reminder of the passionate belief held by Soane and his architectural contemporaries that the quality of a society could be judged by its public buildings. London was then the centre of the largest empire since Rome, and the exhibition includes Soane’s design for two huge triumphal arches (celebrating Waterloo and Trafalgar) at each end of Downing Street. The deliberate association of ancient and modern empires is clear.

Alongside designs for monumental public architecture, In Pursuit of Antiquity also includes more intimate details, such as chimneypieces and domestic furniture, whose Egyptian, Grecian, and Roman nuances reflect aspirations for the birth of a new golden age. The exhibition focuses on ancient Rome and its great monuments as a source of inspiration to the architectural students of the 18th and 19th centuries who exhaustively measured, studied, surveyed, and, above all, drew these structures as part of their education. The exhibition also explores the idea of an architectural drawing—from sketch to final presentation. Drawings by French and Italian artists such as Percier, Clérisseau, and the great Piranesi, all represented in Soane’s collection, illustrate the links between these architects and British architects.

Often described as ‘the father of modern architecture’, Sir John Soane (1753–1837) brought together a magnificent collection of architectural drawings intended to provide exemplars for himself, his sons, and his assistants. It was to be a source of reference, inspiration, ideas, and comparison and later became a key aspect of his conscious creation of a museum collection. Today, the outstanding drawings held at Sir John Soane’s Museum stand alongside the collection of the Royal Institute of British Architects as the two pre-eminent collections of architectural drawings in the country.

Jeremy Musson is an architectural historian, broadcaster and author. He is the author of The Drawing Room: Country House Design and Decoration (2014), English Country House Interiors (2011), How to Read a Country House (2006), and series editor of books published from the archive of Country Life, including The Regency Country House and The Country Houses of Adam. He also contributes to The British Art Journal and The Georgian Group Journal . He lectures regularly, including for the University of Cambridge, the Attingham Summer School, and the Royal Oak. Born in London in 1965, Musson lives in Cambridge with his family.

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Press release for the exhibition now on view at The Getty:

Louis Style: French Frames, 1610–1792
The Getty Center, Los Angeles, 15 September 2015 — 3 January 2016

Curated by Davide Gasparotto, Anne Woollett, and Gene Karraker

Louis Style: French Frames, 1610–1792 celebrates the dramatic stylistic transformation and technical skill of French frame making in the 17th and 18th centuries. Drawn from the J. Paul Getty Museum’s collection of antique frames, this exhibition presents an array of French design in wall furniture under four kings—from the simple moldings and Italian-inspired ornaments in the time of Louis XIII (1610–1643), to the opulent carved and gilded masterpieces in the age of Louis XIV (1643–1715), to the sculptural forms and rich finishes of the transitional period of the Régence (1715–1723) and Louis XV (1723–1774), and concluding with the restrained treatments preferred during the reign of Louis XVI (1774–1792).

Jean-François de Troy, Before the Ball, 1735, oil on canvas, in a Louis XV frame, carved and gilded oak (The J. Paul Getty Museum)

Louis Style: French Frames, 1610–1792 will be the first exhibition devoted to frames at the Getty Museum. Featuring more than forty frames and framed paintings, Louis Style offers visitors the rare opportunity to consider in depth the types and function of this art form. The installation provides a rich compendium of French design and craftsmanship, along with practical tools, such as the vocabulary of ornament needed to identify the period of a frame, as well as insight into the construction and gilding techniques specific to frames made in France. By addressing the important relationship between a painting and its frame (which sometimes date from different periods and regions), visitors to the exhibition will also gain an awareness of the significance and use of frames in museums.

During the early 1600s through the 1700s—a golden age for frame-making in Paris—the functional surrounds for paintings became expressions of artistry, innovation, taste, and wealth. The primary stylistic trendsetters were the kings of France, whose desire for increasingly opulent forms of display spurred the creative efforts of brilliant designers and craftsmen to magnificent expressions of their personal styles. French frames of this period are distinguished by the use of oak and gold leaf as materials, and techniques of water gilding, elaborate carved ornamentation and varied finishes.

Over the course of several decades, the Museum has assembled a substantial group of period frames to enhance and appropriately display its paintings collection, resulting in a rich and varied assemblage of moldings. Enduring visitor interest in frames and framing led to the publication of D. Gene Karraker’s Looking at European Frames: A Guide to Terms, Styles and Techniques (J. Paul Getty Museum, 2009), illustrated exclusively by works in the collection. The celebration of the 300th anniversary of the death of Louis XIV this year, marked by two major loan exhibitions at the Getty Center, provides the opportunity to present one of the largest and most beautiful areas of the frame collection.

Louis Style: French Frames, 1610–1792 was organized by Senior Curator of Paintings and Department Head, Davide Gasparotto, Curator of Paintings, Anne Woollett, and Associate Conservator of Frames, Gene Karraker.