Enfilade

The long 18th century in the May issue of The Burlington:

The Burlington Magazine 167 (May 2025) | French Art

e d i t o r i a l

• “Fashionistas,” p. 427.
The costume institute and its annual gala in May at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (the Met), have become fixtures on the museum world’s map and calendar. Whether you delight in them or are bemused by the spectacle they provide, or indeed try and take no notice at all, they are hard to ignore. The alignment they represent between fashion history, contemporary celebrity and the gravitas of a major museum is immensely beneficial in terms of fundraising and profile.

l e t t e r

• “A Sleeping Apostolado at Wentworth Woodhouse,” pp. 428–29.
We are launching an appeal for the conservation, reframing, and rehanging of an important set of seventeenth-century paintings. We are making this appeal in honour of the art historian Alastair Laing, who died aged seventy-nine in 2024. It was he who identified the artist of this series as the Flemish painter Gérard Seghers (1591–1651). . . . By 1870 the thirteen paintings were framed in groups and fixed against the walls, as they are now, probably to give a more church-like feel to the simple prayer-book chapel of 1736, with its panelling and gallery of craved, unstained oak.

a r t i c l e s

• Yuriko Jackall, John Delaney, and Michael Swicklik, “Friendship Tokens: Jean-Baptiste Greuze’s Paintings for Madame de Pompadour,” pp. 438–49.
Greuze’s paintings, known for their sentimentality and charm, were lauded by the artist’s contemporaries. Two early compositions, Simplicity and Young Shepherd Holding a Flower, were part of the collection of Madame de Pompadour; stylistic and technical analysis of them, in conjunction with another version of Simplicity, expands their early provenance.

• Humphrey Wine, “Napoleon Crossing the Alps: British Press Reaction to the London Exhibitions of David, Lefèvre, Wicar, and Lethière,” pp. 450–59.
Paintings by notable French artists were exhibited in Britain during the first third of the nineteenth century. Reactions to these works published in British newspapers and journals between 1814 and 1830 were often negative in tone and politically motivated. Despite this criticism, these accounts provide a valuable perspective on the art of the period that was shipped across the Channel.

• Daniëlle Kisluk-Grosheide, “Bravery, Ingenuity, and Aerial Post: An Enamelled Bowl by Joséphine-Arthurine Blot,” pp. 470–77.
During the height of the Franco-Prussian War, Gaston Tissandier made a perilous balloon journey from Paris to deliver correspondence from the besieged city. The flight is commemorated in a small bowl by Joséphine-Arthurine Blot, a technically accomplished yet little-known enamellist. Her bold design celebrates Tissandier’s bravery as well as French resistance and resourcefulness.

r e v i e w s

• Alice Minter, Review of Christophe Huchet de Quénetain, Nicolas Besnier (1686–1754): Architecte, orfèvre du roi et échevin de la Ville de Paris (Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2024), pp. 516–17.

• Céline Cachaud, Review of La Tabatière Choiseul: Un monument du XVIIIe siècle, edited by Michèle Bimbenet-Privat (Éditions Faton, 2025), pp. 519–20.

• Mark Evans, Review of Ulrike Müller, Private Collectors in Brussels, Antwerp, and Ghent, ca.1780–1914: Between Public Relevance and Personal Pleasure (Brepols, 2024), pp. 521–22.

o b i t u a r y

• Christopher Baker and Stephen Duffy, Obituary for Rosalind Joy Savill (1951–2024), pp. 526–28.
An immensely successful director of the Wallace Collection, London, and a pre-eminent scholar of eighteenth-century Sèvres porcelain, Rosalind (‘Ros’) Savill had a profound and enduring impact both on the museum and the research she cared passionately about.