Maria Ines Aliverti_The Miniatures of Jean Louis ... - Acting Archives

AAR Acting Archives Essays Supplement 10 – April 2011
the publication in Paris of the four volumes of the Nouvelles récréations physiques et
mathématiques by Monsieur Guyot of the Société littéraire et militaire of Besançon, the
second volume of which was entirely devoted to optical recreations and gave
instructions both on the instruments and on how to produce and paint
transparencies. 72
In drawing-rooms, too, show-boxes used for viewing drawings and engravings
were extremely popular. Theatrical views were composed of perspective sets with or
without characters. The transparencies were mounted in the show-box: thanks to the
optical device the whole scene was visible with a depth of field that enhanced its
realism. The taste for theatrical vues d’optique thus created a way of looking at the
scene and the actors that was imaginary, iconic and removed from the material
conditions of performance. We must therefore take account of this cultural context,
which saw reproduction play a growing role in the diffusion of visual spectacle, in
order to grasp fully the significance of Faesch’s miniatures.
Faesch’s miniatures, probably painted using a camera obscura, were also destined
to be viewed in a show-box. 73 The vellum used by Faesch as support for drawing,
sometimes oiled to secure its transparency, the density of the pigments, and the
outlines marked in Chinese ink to highlight the pattern of colours, suggest that these
gouaches, or at least many of them, were born as enluminures d’optique, for which
special paint mixtures were selected. 74
However, in order to reach well-founded hypotheses on Faesch’s procedure and
his possible use of optical instruments, we must ask whether he had foreseen right
from the beginning, that is from 1765, the possibility of producing multiple copies of
the same vignette, something which does not seem unlikely, at least within certain
limits. It seems improbable, in fact, that the actors who agreed to be portrayed would
not have wanted a copy of the miniatures for themselves. We know that Lekain
possessed some, and the same is undoubtedly true of the others. However, it does
not necessarily follow that the idea of “serial” production, or of having the vignettes
engraved, came right at the beginning. It is no coincidence, in fact, that they were
actually engraved several years later: the first edition of Les Métamorphoses was
published at the end of 1769, several years after Garrick’s stay in Paris, which, as we
portative’ on p. 63. This portable camera was told to be of a great usefulness for amateur artists who
intended to draw from life with right proportions and precision of details: ‘Par le moyen de cet
instrument, […] quelqu’un qui ne sait pas le dessein pourra néanmoins dessiner les objets avec la
dernière justesse et la dernière exactitude; et celui qui sait dessiner ou même peindre pourra encore par
ce même moyen se perfectionner dans son art’. Two sorts of portable cameras, with lenses mounted
horizontally or vertically, whose construction was explained in detail in the above mentioned entry,
were after illustrated in the ‘Recueil de planches’, ibid., IV (1767), Optyque (figg. 17-18).
72 Edme Gilles Guyot, Nouvelles récréations physiques et mathématiques, 4 vols., Paris, Gueffier, 1769-1770.
73 For details see below and Section 7.
74 An advertisement cited by Mannoni, regarding precisely the commerce by Guyot of this sort of
special paint: ‘Guyot vend en 1769 des “couleurs en tablettes au nombre de vingt, propres pour ces
sortes d’enluminures d’optique”: bleu de Prusse, gomme-gutte (jaune), carmin, vert d’eau, vert de vessie
(vert clair), indigo, safran, bistre, pierre de fiel (jaune sale), encre “de la Chine”, laque de Venise
(rouge), “amer” de bœuf ou de carpe (“sert pour faciliter les couleurs à s’étendre lorsque le papier est
gras”), alun (sel pour imbiber les estampes)’ (italics added). L. Mannoni, Le grand art de la lumière et de
l’ombre, p. 91. Only chemical analysis could confirm whether Faesch’s paints include these
components, although several of them, such as Prussian blue and Chinese ink, are recognizable to the
eye.
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