Seminar Session | Ersy Contogouris on Vigée-LeBrun’s Self-Portraits
This month’s session from the GRHS series on women’s self-portraits, with information on other GRHS seminar series available here:
Ersy Contogouris | Les autoportraits d’Élisabeth Vigée-LeBrun au Salon de 1787
Autoportraits au féminin (XVIe–XVIIIe siècle) –Séminaire du Groupe de Recherche en Histoire des Sociabilités
Université du Québec, Montréal, Thursday, 13 October 2022, 2.00pm
Cette conférence étudiera l’autoportrait qu’Élisabeth Vigée-LeBrun expose au Salon de 1787. Vigée-LeBrun avait été admise à l’Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture en 1783 aux côtés d’Adélaïde Labille-Guiard, portant ainsi à quatre le nombre de femmes membres de l’Académie pour la première fois depuis sa fondation en 1648, et à quinze le nombre total de femmes y ayant été admises. Cette présence féminine à l’Académie n’étant pas appréciée de tous, les années 1780 et les Salons bisannuels de 1783, 1785 et 1787 furent marqué·es par de nombreux débats portant sur la place des femmes dans le plus important espace artistique français. L’autoportrait de Vigée-LeBrun, dans lequel elle se représente avec sa fille Julie, sera mis en dialogue avec les autres œuvres présentées par Vigée-LeBrun à ce Salon afin de réfléchir à ce groupe de tableaux comme une sorte d’autoreprésentation de l’artiste en 1787.
Symposium | Richard Castle
From Russborough House:
Richard Castle Symposium
Russborough House, Blessington, County Wicklow, 4 November 2022
Richard Castle was the pre-eminent architect and landscape designer in Ireland from 1733 until his death in 1750. Yet there is still much to learn about his origins, training, office practice, and engagement with craft practitioners. His commissions included the principal town and country houses of the period and public buildings in the capital and the provinces. His surviving domestic works include Powerscourt, Hazelwood, Iveagh House, Tyrone House, Westport House, Carton, Leinster House, Newman House (85 St Stephen’s Green), Belvedere House, and Russborough, together with public projects such as Knockbreda Church and the Rotunda Hospital.
This one-day symposium draws together new and existing scholarship on Castle’s output and considers his legacy in terms of architecture, decoration, and landscape. The first such event dedicated to Richard Castle, it includes speakers from Ireland, Europe, and Britain and takes place in one of the architect’s finest and best-preserved buildings, Russborough House in County Wicklow. Tickets can be purchased here: €55 / €25 Student (includes lunch and refreshments).
P R O G R A M M E
9.30 Registration
10.00 Morning Session
• Christine Casey (Trinity College Dublin) — Richard Castle, Architect: What We Know and What We Need to Know
• Barbara Freitag (Dublin City University) — The Troubled Life of Richard Castle
• Simon Lincoln (Irish Architectural Archive) — Drawings by Richard Castle at the Irish Architectural Archive
• Nele Luttmann (Trinity College Dublin) — Richard Castle and 18th-Century Woodworking Crafts
• Andrew Tierney (Trinity College Dublin) — Staircases and Stair Halls in the Work of Richard Castle: A Study in 18th-Century Craftsmanship
1.00 Lunch
2.00 Afternoon Session
• Melanie Hayes (Trinity College Dublin) — Craft Practice in Richard Castle’s Early Country Houses
• Steven Brindle (English Heritage) — Richard Castle in the Context of British 18th-Century Architecture
• Finola O’Kane Crimmins (University College Dublin) — Richard Castle’s Landscapes: Design Challenges and Opportunities
• Christopher Gallagher (Historic landscape consultant) — Richard Castle and the Early Designed Landscape at Russborough
New Book | Dublin Castle: From Fortress to Palace
From Wordwell Books:
Seán Duffy, John Montague, Kevin Mulligan, and Michael O’Neill, Dublin Castle: From Fortress to Palace, Volume 1: Vikings to Victorians, A History of Dublin Castle to 1850 (Dublin: Wordwell Books, 2022), 320 pages, ISBN: 978-1446880715, €50 / $70.
This is the first of a three-volume series dedicated to Dublin Castle and the archaeological excavations carried out there. Volume 1 presents a history of Dublin Castle, covering the period from the first Viking settlement in the ninth century to 1850. The castle was the centre of English (and later British) royal government in Ireland from the 1170s until it was handed over to the Provisional Government of Ireland in 1922. A large early thirteenth-century castle, built on the orders of King John, stood on the site until it was gradually replaced between the 1680s and the 1770s by the present quadrangle of palatial buildings. The only intact portion of the medieval castle to survive this rebuilding is the large, circular south-east corner tower, known today as the Record Tower. It is the first substantial history of the castle to be published and is intended to provide a comprehensive historical background to the results of archaeological excavations undertaken between 1961 and 1987.
Conference | Rereading Constable
John Constable, Sir Richard Steele’s Cottage, Hampstead, 1831–32, oil on canvas, 21 × 29 cm
(New Haven: Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection, B2001.2.25)
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From PMC:
Rereading Constable: Letters, Life, and Art
In-person and online, Paul Mellon Centre, London, 2 December 2022
Organized by Stephen Daniels and Mark Hallett
How do artists’ letters articulate professional and personal affiliations, embody networks, and forge allegiances? What role has letter writing played in artistic self-fashioning? In what ways do letters serve as a form of art-historical evidence, and help us understand works of art themselves?
R.B. Beckett’s multi-volume edition of Constable’s correspondence, published in six volumes by the Suffolk Records Society (1962–68), has long been recognised as an invaluable source for scholars working on the artist, and for all those interested in British art and culture in the late Georgian period. The published correspondence shows the painter to have been a shrewd, skilled writer, versed in a variety of literary, scientific, and biblical texts. His correspondents were, in turn, often highly articulate writers, including many family members, and many more with very different characters and backgrounds. Often utilised by art historians, the correspondence has more recently attracted the interest of scholars interested in the literary character and rhetorical conventions of nineteenth-century correspondence, who have subjected Constable’s letters to new kinds of critical scrutiny. This event will build on this important work, exploring Romantic art, culture, and society through the prism provided by the landscape painter’s correspondence.
The central structuring concept of this interdisciplinary conference is that speakers will focus on a single letter written by the artist, his correspondents, or other contemporary figures whose work, life, or letters can be understood in productive relation to Constable himself. These individual letters will be used to open up new questions and arguments about Constable’s life, practice, and identity as a painter, and about the wider artistic, literary, religious, and political cultures of his era.
Rereading Constable: Letters, Life, and Art has been organised as part of the PMC’s Generation Landscape research project. The conference is being convened by Stephen Daniels and Mark Hallett. Book tickets here.
We are offering up to five bursaries to support individuals who may not otherwise be able to attend the conference. Bursaries will cover the ticket price, travel, and some expenses, including childcare. If you would like to be considered for a bursary please email events@paul-mellon-centre.ac.uk with Rereading Constable Bursary in the subject field, outlining your request for a supported place by 10am, Friday, 4 November 2022.
P R O G R A M M E
9.30 Introduction by Mark Hallett (Paul Mellon Centre) and Stephen Daniels (University of Nottingham)
10.00 Session 1 | Chair: Stephen Daniels
• Alexandra Harris (University of Birmingham), New Friends, New Scenes: Constable in the Arun Valley
• Amy Concannon (University of York and Tate Britain), Strengthening Ties and Gaining Esteem: Constable Writes to Wordsworth, 15 June 1836
11.00 Tea and Coffee Break
11.30 Session 2 | Chair: Martin Postle (Paul Mellon Centre)
• Emma Roodhouse (Art Curator and Researcher), An Evening’s Amusement: Portraits, Writing, and Other Oddments from the Mason Family Album
• Sarah Cove (The Constable Research Project), A Regency ‘Nip-and-Tuck’: Constable’s Treslove Portraits Rediscovered
12.30 Lunch (provided by PMC)
Constable material available to view in the Public Study Room
1.30 Session 3 | Chair: Mark Hallett
• Morna O’Neill (Wake Forest University), John Constable, David Lucas, and Artistic Identity
• Katharine Martin (V&A and the University of Sussex), Translations and Fraught Relations: English Landscape and the Language of Collaboration
2.30 Break
2.45 Session 4 | Chair: Sarah Victoria Turner (Paul Mellon Centre)
• Gillian Forrester (Independent Scholar), ‘Solemnity, Not Gaiety’: Language and the Production of Meaning in Constable’s English Landscape Scenery
• Elenor Ling (The Fitzwilliam Museum), The ‘Definition of our Book’: John Constable, David Lucas, and their English Landscape
3.45 Tea and Coffee Break
4.15 Session 5 | Chair: Sria Chatterjee (Paul Mellon Centre)
• Rhian Addison McCreanor (University of York and Tate Britain), Repairing the House with a Thorough Painting: Reimagining 63 Charlotte Street
• Nicholas Robbins (University College London), The Life Academy and the Origins of Landscape
5.15 Panel Discussion
Stephen Daniels (University of Nottingham), Martin Myrone (Paul Mellon Centre), Trev Broughton (University of York), and Timothy Wilcox (Independent Scholar)
5.55 Closing Remarks by Mark Hallett
6.00 Drinks Reception
Exhibition | Maria Hadfield Cosway
Now on view at the Fondazione Maria Cosway in Lodi, in the nineteenth-century rooms of the Collegio delle Grazie, the girls’ school that Cosway founded in 1812 (with additional information available here) . . .
Maria Hadfield Cosway
Fondazione Maria Cosway, Lodi, 23 September — 27 November 2022
Curated by Monja Faraoni and Laura Facchin with Massimiliano Ferrario and Maria Cristina Loi
Oltre cinquanta opere tra dipinti, lettere, spartititi musicali e sculture che ripercorrono la vita di Maria Hadfield Cosway (1760–1838) sono esposti a Lodi nella mostra a lei dedicata visitabile fino al 27 novembre.
Il visitatore sarà accompagnato nel percorso da pannelli esplicativi e didascalie che mettono in luce le fasi essenziali della biografia dell’artista e filantropa, nonché i personaggi e gli eventi della “Grande Storia” che segnarono le diverse fasi della sua vita. L’artista e donna di cultura è molto nota sia a Londra che negli Stati Uniti d’America per la sua amicizia con Thomas Jefferson, terzo Presidente USA. Un periodo della sua vita lo trascorse anche a Lodi, dove morì nel 1838.
La sua profonda convinzione nell’importanza dell’educazione per i giovani portò Maria Cosway ad aprire proprio a Lodi, nella sede dell’ex convento dei padri Minimi, il collegio della Beata Vergine Maria delle Grazie, destinato alle bambine dai 6 ai 12 anni, che ospiterà anche Vittoria Manzoni.
La mostra è stata organizzata dalla Fondazione Maria Cosway e vede la collaborazione di diverse realtà locali tra cui due istituti lodigiani, il liceo artistico Callisto Piazza e la Fondazione Luigi Clerici. Studenti ed insegnanti sono stati coinvolti nella creazione del catalogo e dell’allestimento delle diverse tappe dell’esposizione, visitabile presso la sede della Fondazione di via Paolo Gorini 10.
Monja Faraoni, Laura Facchin, Massimiliano Ferrario, and Maria Cristina Loi, eds., Maria Hadfield Cosway (Lodi: Fondazione Maria Cosway, 2022), 444 pages, ISBN: 979-1280950208.
S O M M A R I O
Presentazioni istituizionali
Maria Cosway tra Firenze, Londra, Parigi e Lodi: Le Ragioni della Mostra
• L’educazione in età napoleonica — Mario Riberi
• Maria Cosway in London, 1780–1790 and 1794–1801 — Stephen Lloyd
• ‘I am susceptible and everything that surrounds me has great power to magnetise me’: Maria Cosway e l’ambiente romantico — Massimiliano Ferrario
• Maria Cosway et l’ambiente artistico-letterario femminile fra la fine dell’Antico Regime e la Restaurazione — Laura Facchin
• Maria Cosway, Leonardo e Giuseppe Bossi: fra teorie artistiche e appunti figurativi — Rosalba Antonelli
• La musica nella vita e nel progetto educativo di Maria Cosway — Patrizia Fiorio
• Una storia ancora da raccontare: la biblioteca della Fondazione Maria Cosway — Francesco Laghezza e Beatrice Porchera
• La moda nella Parigi et nella Milano di Maria Cosway — Silvia Mira
• La vita di Blevio — Laura Facchin e Massimiliano Ferrario
• Un titolo nobitare per Maria Cosway — Luca Marcarini
• Gaetano Manfredini: ‘volente scultore pei quale l’ingiusta sorte non ha benigni sorris!’ e l’eterno volto di Maria Cosway — Beatrice Bolandrini
Catalogolo delle opere
Maria Cosway et gli Stati Uniti, a cura di Maria Cristina Loi
• ‘But that immense sea, makes it a great distance’: note sui carteggio Maria Cosway–Thomas Jefferson — Maria Cristina Loi
• Thomas Jefferson and Maria Cosway in Paris: art and affection — Susan R. Stein
Catalogo delle opere
L’allestimento della mostra Maria Hadfield Cosway — Elena Amoriello, Luca Armigero, Annalisa Aversa, Maria Teresa Carossa, Chiara Lupi, Susanna Marinoni e Angela Mento
Bibliografia
Indice dei nomi
Credit fotografici
Exhibition | Canaletto: A Venetian’s View
Canaletto, View of the Grand Canal Looking East from Palazzo Bembo to Palazzo Vendramin-Calergi, mid 1730s, oil on canvas, 47 × 80 cm
(Woburn Abbey Collection, Bedfordshire)
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Now on view at Worcester City Art Gallery:
Canaletto: A Venetian’s View
Worcester City Art Gallery and Museum, 1 October 2022 — 7 January 2023
Curated by Deborah Fox
Celebrating the work of Canaletto, particularly paintings commissioned by the 4th Duke of Bedford in the 1730s, the exhibition features stunning paintings from the Woburn Abbey Collection alongside artworks from Worcester’s Fine Art Collection and loans from Birmingham Museums, Tate, and Compton Verney.
Born in Venice, Giovanni Antonio Canal (1697–1768), commonly known as Canaletto, was an important member of the 18th-century Venetian school. He became very popular with English collectors and visited England repeatedly between 1746 and 1756. Canaletto revolutionised the use of colour, ground, and canvas and pioneered the technique of painting from life, sitting in front of the subject outdoors as opposed to his contemporaries who completed paintings in the studio. Canaletto: A Venetian’s View explores the painter’s work and the impact he had on the generations of artists who followed him.
It is extremely rare for this hugely significant collection to leave Woburn Abbey, and this is the first time the paintings have been united with other examples of Canaletto’s work from Birmingham Museums and Compton Verney. The paintings on display comprise the largest set of paintings Canaletto produced for a single patron, John Russell, the 4th Duke of Bedford, who commissioned the works in the 1730s. They are considered the absolute best of Canaletto’s paintings of Venice. The exhibition is being described as the most ambitious in the history of Worcester City Art Gallery & Museum.
William Marlow, View on the Thames, ca. 1775, oil on canvas, 49 × 79 cm (London: Tate, T00930).
Deborah Fox, Senior Curator at the Art Gallery and Museum commented: “We are committed to bringing great art and artists to the region and through bringing Canaletto to Worcester we are offering a once in a generation opportunity to see these incredible artworks ‘on your doorstep’ as well as creating an opportunity to showcase and reinterpret important works in our own collection. We see this exhibition as a wonderful opportunity not only to bring world class art to the gallery, but also to examine its influence on some of Worcester’s best-loved artworks.”
The twenty paintings of Venice on loan from the Woburn Abbey Collection are accompanied by three other works by Canaletto—two views of Warwick Castle on loan from Birmingham Museums and a view of Vauxhall Gardens that normally hangs at Compton Verney—as well as by a wonderful work from Tate painted by William Marlow considered to be Canaletto’s natural heir. Canaletto’s influence is further explored through Worcester City Art Gallery and Museum’s own collection including a beautiful view of Worcester Cathedral by Marlow and works by Paul Sandby, Samuel Prout, and Samuel Rowlandson—all of whom were heavily influenced by Canaletto. Worcester’s most famous artist, B.W. Leader, is represented in the exhibition through the inclusion of one of his most famous works, February Fill Dyke (1881), also on loan from Birmingham Museums.
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Matthew Hirst, Canaletto in Context
Worcester City Art Gallery and Museum, Thursday, 13 October 2022, 6pm
Matthew Hirst, Curator at Woburn Abbey, will discuss the fascinating paintings by Canaletto currently on display at Worcester City Art Gallery and Museum, exploring their context in wider fine and decorative arts in the collections at Woburn Abbey in Bedfordshire. Tickets include exhibition entry, a drink, and the talk.
Lecture | David Cannadine on How to Study Country Houses Now
Harewood House, West Yorkshire, designed by John Carr and Robert Adam, and built between 1759 and 1771.
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From The Attingham Trust:
Sir David Cannadine, How Do We Study the Country House Now?
In-person (and recorded), Sotheby’s, London, Tuesday, 8 November 2022
The Attingham Trust has been championing the study of historic houses and their collections for seven decades, aiming to broaden the understanding of the artistic, social and cultural legacies they offer. In this lecture, David Cannadine will look afresh at these buildings and tease out some of the many complex and sometimes challenging narratives to which they bear witness, illustrating how the study of the country house has evolved and how much still remains for us to learn.
5.45pm Drinks on arrival
6.30pm Lecture
Tickets for both in-person attendance and to receive the recording (available for a limited time) can be purchased here. For queries about this event, please contact rebecca.parker@attinghamtrust.org.
Professor Sir David Cannadine is Dodge Professor of History at Princeton University and a visiting professor of history at Oxford University. He has written extensively on the economic, social, political, and cultural history of modern Britain and its empire, on collecting and philanthropy, and on the history of history. In 2018 he co-edited, with Jeremy Musson, The Country House: Past, Present, and Future, exploring how the idea of the country house has changed over the last forty years. Previously Chair of the Trustees at the National Portrait Gallery, President of the British Academy, and on the board of the Royal Oak Foundation, he is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society, the Royal Society for Literature, the Society of Antiquaries, the Historical Association, and the British Academy. He is a patron of The Attingham Trust.
Call for Papers | Art beyond Placeness
Attributed to François Bunel the Younger, The Confiscation of the Contents of an Art Dealer’s Gallery, 1590, oil on panel, 28 × 47 cm
(The Hague: Mauritshuis, 875)
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From ArtHist.net:
Art beyond Placeness: Narratives of Movement in the Early Modern Period
Norwegian Institute in Rome, 31 May — 1 June 2023
Proposals due by 1 November 2022
In recent years, the new importance attributed to the biographies of objects and their global circulation has drawn new attention to the phenomenon of their physical transportation—in other words, to the complex set and modes of actions required to move an object from the point of creation to its final destination. Inspired by the growing body of scholarship, this workshop aims to develop new instruments to perceive, measure, and interpret the movement of things, by looking specifically at the way physical transportation has been described, inspected, and dissected in early modern sources. The materials under scrutiny here may take different forms, from diaries, letters, and other prosopographical accounts recording movement in its making; to archival materials that track unusual patterns of transportation and physical delivery; to letters, treatises, and even guides or handbooks reporting ex post facto descriptions of mobility. This workshop intends to probe this vast collection of sources in order to tease out how mobility was described and conceptualized, surveyed, and explored in the long early modern period (approximately from 1350 to 1800), before the rise of modern logistics. In short, it addresses from all angles the narrative potential of mobility: how describing movement ‘makes a good story’.
Potential topics include, but are not limited to
• Episodes of transportation recorded in archival materials, with special regard to the logistical demands and expenses encountered by artists in moving objects from the artistic workshop to the final destination
• Diaries and letters of artists and patrons describing physical transportation of objects
• Written sources that emphasize the miraculous, divine components of transportation
• 18th-century popularization of movement in the so-called ‘circulation narrative’ or ‘IT narratives’, which tell the story of inanimate objects exchanged and moved from place to place
• Treatises and technical accounts describing the logistical operations of transportation
The workshop will take place on May 31st and June 1st 2023 at the Norwegian Institute in Rome. ECRs are especially invited to present their research for discussion. Please submit an abstract of no more than 300 words, along with your CV to mattia.biffis@roma.uio.no by 1 November 2022. Travel expenses and participation will be covered.
Call for Papers | Rococo across Borders: Designers and Makers
From the Call for Papers:
Rococo across Borders: Designers and Makers
London, venue TBC, 24–25 March 2023
Organized by the Furniture History Society and the French Porcelain Society
Proposals due by 4 November 2022
We are delighted to announce that the Furniture History Society and the French Porcelain Society will be joining forces in Spring 2023 to hold a two-day symposium on the theme of Rococo across Borders: Designers and Makers. Using the Versailles exhibition Louis XV, Passion d’un roi / Passions of a King as our starting point, the symposium will broaden out to discuss the geographical spread of the style, the interaction between designers and makers, and the significant roles played by print culture and the evolving art market in disseminating the Rococo across Europe.
This symposium calls for papers that go beyond the traditional geographical, chronological, and conceptual fields of Rococo design to explore how it evolved throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In particular, it aims to open up wider discussions about the historical contexts for Rococo ceramics and furniture, the place of the ‘Rococo’ in museums and art historical scholarship today, and its impact on contemporary makers. We invite submissions for 30-minute conference papers. Topics for consideration may include, but are not limited to the following:
• ‘Beyond Rococo’: ceramics, furniture, and decorative schemes outside France
• Networks: makers, designers, and consumers across borders
• Case studies of individual interiors or objects
• Changing reception: scholastic and the art market
Please submit an abstract of 250–300 words and a short biography to diana_davis@hotmail.co.uk and events@furniturehistorysociety.org by Friday, 4 November 2022. Please email events@furniturehistorysociety.org with any queries.
Organizing Committee
Diana Davis, Patricia Ferguson, Beatrice Goddard, Caroline McCaffrey-Howarth, David Oakey, and Adriana Turpin
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Picture Credits: Top left to bottom right, Flower vase (cuvette Mahon), probably designed by Jean-Claude Duplessis, Sèvres Manufactory, soft-paste porcelain, ca. 1757–60 (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1974.356.592); Side chair, attributed to Benjamin Randolph, Philadelphia, mahogany, ca. 1769 (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1974.325); Vase, Chelsea factory, soft-paste porcelain, ca. 1762 (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1970.313.2a); Commode attributed to William Vile and John Cobb, mahogany, pine, gilt-bronze, ca. 1760 (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 64.101.1142); Girandolle à branche de porcelaine garnie d’Or, from Oeuvres de Juste-Aurèle Meissonnier, engraved by Gabriel Huquier, French, 1738–49 (Cooper-Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, 1921-6-212-29-b); Porcelain Room designed by Giuseppe Gricci, Real Fábrica de Porcelana del Buen Retiro, installed in the Palace of Aranjuez, 1763–65; Commode designed by Jean-François Cuvilliés, the Elder, pine partially painted and gilded, ca. 1735–40 (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 28.154).
Exhibition | Louis XV: Passions of a King
Opening this month at Versailles:
Louis XV: Passions of a King / Passion d’un roi
Château de Versailles, 18 October 2022 — 19 February 2023
Curated by Yves Carlier and Hélène Delalex
For the 300th anniversary of King Louis XV’s coronation, Palace of Versailles is paying homage with an exceptional exhibition. Through more than 400 works, visitors can discover Louis XV (1710–1774) beyond his function as monarch, learning more about his passions, his family life, and his influence on the arts of his time.
Born in 1710 in Versailles, Louis XV was the son of the Duke of Burgundy and Marie-Adélaïde of Savoy, as well as the great-grandson of Louis XIV. Heir apparent after the death of his father, he became king at the tender age of five after the death of the Sun King on 1 September 1715.
A Private Man
The exhibition opens with an introduction to Louis XV as a man, looking back on his relations with his family and his entourage. His childhood, marked by grief, contrasts with his later life with his large family, where he delighted in his role as a father. Women also occupied a central place in the King’s life, such as his wife Marie Leszczynska, not to mention his many mistresses (some of whom made their mark on the period). The exhibition also explores Louis XV’s discreet, melancholy nature, a man who preferred the intimacy of his private apartments. There, he received his inner circle, who enjoyed his every confidence.
The King’s Tastes and Passions
The tour continues with the Louis XV’s passion for sciences, botany, and hunting, as well as his love of buildings, and the influence of all these fields on his reign. His curiosity and insatiable thirst for knowledge drove him to fund long sea voyages, transform Trianon into a garden full of botanical experiments, commission cutting-edge scientific tools, and order the mapping of the kingdom.
Louis XV and the Arts of His Time
The final section of the exhibition shows how the arts flourished during the reign of the ‘Well-Beloved’ (Bien-Aimé). Multiple masterpieces of rococo art introduced the public to the foundations of this style, which, free of symmetry and formal rules, shook up artistic creation in the 18th century.
Meet the Favourites
For this exhibition, the apartment of Madame de Pompadour, as well as that of Madame du Barry, freshly restored after eighteen months of work, will be opened to the public for guided tours, offering a unique experience at the heart of Louis XV’s private Versailles.
The exhibition is curated by Yves Carlier, Chief Heritage Curator at the Musée National des Châteaux de Versailles et de Trianon; and Hélène Delalex, Heritage Curator at the Musée National des Châteaux de Versailles et de Trianon.
Yves Carlier and Hélène Delalex, eds., Louis XV: Passion d’un roi (Château de Versailles / In Fine éditions d’art, 2022), 496 pages, ISBN: 978-2382030769, 49€.
S O M M A I R E
Introduction
Louis XV
L’Homme Privé
Une enfance de cimetière. Louis XV et la mort
Louis XV aux Tuileries, 1715–1722
1722, le retour à Versailles
Le sacre de Louis XV
Le mariage de Louis XV
Louis XV et ses enfants
Amis et amies du roi : les intimes
Les sœurs Mailly-Nesle ou la guerre des Nattier
Madame de Pompadour : l’amie nécessaire
Jeanne du Barry et le roi : une conspiration du silence
Les soupers des cabinets
Louis XV et la religion
Le Parc aux Cerfs : mythe révolutionnaire ou réalité historique ?
L’attentat de Damiens
Gôuts et Passions du Roi
L’esprit des livres : les bibliothèques personnelles de Louis XV
Louis XV, les livres et la reliure : la naissance de la bibliophilie moderne ?
Les expériences d’électricité sous le règne de Louis XV : un succès foudroyant
Le cabinet de Physique et d’Optique de Louis XV au château de La Muette 222
Louis XV « dans son particulier » : les tours du roi
Louis XV et la chasse
Louis XV et le théâtre
Louis XV et l’architecture
Les Arts sous le Règne de Louis XV
Rocaille : la forme et la force
Pour un art de cour ? Louis XV face aux arts de son temps
Boîtes et tabatières à la cour de France sous Louis XV
La Saxe en or moulu. Le goût pour les porcelaines de Meissen montées à la cour de Louis XV
L’importance des Gobelins et de la Savonnerie
Louis XV et la manufacture de porcelaine de Vincennes-Sèvres
Louis XV : une peinture pour le quotidien
Louis XV et la sculpture
La marquise de Pompadour et les arts : une « Apologie du luxe »
Madame Du Barry à la cour : l’affirmation d’un goût
Le Roi se meurt
« Qui nous délivrera de Louis XV et de son perpétuel recommencement ? » Le retour des lignes rocaille dans les arts décoratifs français du XIXe siècle
Bibliographie
Enfilade
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