Pt Two

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
A Johann Lucas von Hildebrandt. Belvedere (Vienna),
1721-3
Johann Lucas von Hildebrandt/ Prince Eugene of Savoy/
influence of Versailles/ Upper and Lower Belvedere/
journey through Parnassus to Olympus/ Sala Terrena/
French style garden by Dominique Girard
1. “The Belvedere was built by
Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt
as the summer residence of Prince
Eugene of Savoy, the brilliant
military commander whose
strategies helped vanquish the
Turks in 1683. Situated on a
gently sloping hill, the Belvedere
consists of two palaces linked by a
formal garden laid out in the French style by Dominique Girard. The
garden is sited on three levels, each based upon a complicated system
of Classical allusions: the lower part of the garden represents the
domain of the Four Elements, the center is Parnassus and the upper
section is Olympus...Children and cherubs representing the twelve
months adorn the steps to the left and right in the middle area of the
gardens” (Brook 150).
2. “The guests who attended Prince Eugene‟s masked balls and firework
displays were accommodated in grand style in the Upper Belvedere,
which looks down on the formal garden and the Lower Belvedere from
its high vantage point… The fantasy effect created by the Rococo
decoration is heightened by the long roofs of the main building, which
bear more than a passing resemblance to the shape of ceremonial
Oriental tents, and by the mosque-like domes on the octagonal side
pavilions. The entrance to the building from the garden side is through
the Sala Terrena, or Garden Room, whose stuccoed vault is supported
by massive Herculean figures. The staircase rising out of the entrance
hall carries military trophies, emblems of war and scenes from the life
of Alexander the Great” (Bugler 35). “The entire layout is a perfect
expression of the Baroque genius for scenographic spatial organization,
in which the architecture is an incident in an enclosed environment
defined by formal gardens, terraces, steps, avenues, fountains and
artificial lakes” (Watkin 277).
C Jean-Phililppe Rameau and Modern Harmony
1. “The development of eighteenth-century music was made
possible by the codification of the modern system of harmony,
which… was spelled out in it final form in the Treatise on Harmony
(1722) by the French composer Jean-Philippe Rameau. This system
was based on the „tempered‟ diatonic scale, a progression of notes
derived by equaling spacing („tempering‟) 12 tones within an octave (in
essence, the black-and-white keys of a piano). The tonal distance, or
interval, between any two of these one-twelfth-octave tones is called a
semitone or „half step.‟ Twice that interval is called a whole tone or
„whole step.‟ The diatonic system included two principal scales, the
major scale- the familiar „do-re-mi‟ that music students practice- and a
modification of it called the minor scale” (Janson 606). “Like Greek
modes, the major and minor scales communicate emotional qualities.
Generally, a listener experiences the major scale as positive and
optimistic and the minor scale as somber or plaintive. The tempered
scale allowed a keyboard to include a number of octaves, which in turn
increased the range of music that could be written for keyboard
instruments. The 48 pieces that Johann Sebastian Bach wrote in his
Well-Tempered Chair (1722, 1744) were one of the first series of
compositions that exploited the possibilities of the newly expanded
keyboard” (606).
21
B Balthasar Neumann. Pilgrimage chapel of
Vierzehnheiligen (near Staffelstein,
Germany), 1743-72
Balthasar Neumann/ a series of ovals
suggesting a fluent “pulse” or “flow” / light and
airy interior/ analogous to Bach‟s Baroque
music
1. A leading exponent of Rococo
architecture was the German
architect Balthasar Neumann
(1687-1753) (Adams, Art Across
Time 689). “One of the most
opulent Rococo church interiors
still to be seen in Germany and
Austria is that of the Church of
the Vierzehnheiligen (Fourteen
Auxiliary Saints) near
Staffelstein, which was begun by
Neumann in 1743 but was not
completed until 1772, long after
his death. The grand Baroque
façade gives little hint of the
overall plan, which is based on
six interpenetrating oval spaces
of varying sizes around a dominant dome ovoid center… On
the interior of the nave, the Rococo love of undulating
surfaces and overlays of decoration creates a visionary
world where flat wall surfaces scarcely exist. Instead, the
viewer is surrounded by clusters of pilasters and engaged
columns interspersed with two levels of arched openings to
the side aisles and large clerestory windows illuminating the
gold and white of the interior. The foliage of the fanciful
capitals is repeated here and there in arabesques, wreaths,
and the ornamental frames of the irregular panels that line
the vault” (Stokstad, Art History 808-9).
2. “In the center of the nave of the Church of
Vierzehnheiligen, an elaborate shrine was built over the
spot where, in the fifteenth century, a shepherd had visions
of the Christ Child surrounded by saints. The saints came
to be known as the Holy Helpers because they assisted
people in need” (808). “The design‟s fluency of line, the
floating and hovering surfaces, the interwoven spaces, and
the dematerialized masses combine to suggest a „frozen‟
counterpart to the intricacy of voices in a Bach fugue”
(Kleiner, Mamiya, and Tansey 779).
3. This church was “begun in 1743 on the hilltop site above
the river Main where a shepherd in 1445 had a vision of the
Christ Child surrounded by fourteen saints in the form of
children. The dynamic verticality of its twin-towered façade,
not rich in ornamental detail, leads to a rippling interior
apparently designed as a radiant expression of divine
gaiety” (Watkin 280). “In concept the church is a basilica
with a Latin cross plan consisting of three longitudinal
ovals, the central and largest of the oval vaults being placed
not over the crossing but over the saints‟ altar to the west.
Over the crossing, where one might expect a dome, the vault
is dissolved and is represented by four interpenetrating
spaces defined by three-dimensional arches. Further spatial
complexity derives from the carrying of the complex vaults
not on the outer walls but on piers which separate the nave
from open galleried aisles. Light thus floods in through
these openings from the three storeys of windows in the
outer walls” (280, 282).

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
D Giovanni Battista Tiepolo. The Banquet of Cleopatra (Palazzo Labia, Venice), 1746-50, fresco
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo/ Antony and Cleopatra/ a pearl for dessert/ luxury and the Labia family in Venice/
Tiepolo and Mengozzi Colonna / trompe l‟oeil architectural details
1. “The ceilings of Late Baroque palaces sometimes became painted festivals for the
imagination. The master of such works, Giambattista Tiepolo (1696-1770), was the last
great Italian painter to have an international impact until the twentieth century” (Kleiner,
Mamiya, and Tansey 780). Between 1746 and 1750, Tiepolo and his assistants decorated a
banqueting-hall for the noble Labia family in Venice. The work, covering 500 square meters, tells the
story of Cleopatra. In this particular fresco, “spellbound, the assembled guests gaze at a woman
about the redeem a wager. Cleopatra VII, Queen of Egypt, had boasted the Roman general, Antony,
that she could devour a hundred times one hundred thousand sesterces at one meal… The Roman
author Pliny the Elder, writing during the first century after Christ, had described the scene in his
Natural History. Cleopatra, according to Pliny, had served up a banquet which, though sumptuous,
amounted to little more than one of their everyday meals. Seeing this, Antony had merely laughed
and asked to see the bill. Cleopatra had then assured Antony that he had seen no more than the
trimmings, whereas the feast to come would certainly cost the agreed amount. She had then ordered
dessert. However, the servants had placed before her only a single dish, filled with vinegar,
whereupon the queen had removed one of her earrings, dipped it into the vinegar, let it dissolve, and
swallowed it” (Hagen and Hagen, What Great Paintings Say 1: 116).
2. “Tiepolo‟s contemporaries were probably in a better position than Pliny to appreciate Cleopatra‟s
lifestyle. The Venetian Republic had lost most of its political and military power by the 18 th century.
At the same time, its citizens attempted to make up for their sense of loss by squandering the vast
wealth they had accumulated during their glorious past… During the 17 th century, when the
maritime republic had been desperate for money to fight the Turks, the Labia had used the
opportunity to buy their way into Venice‟s exclusive patrician circles. A legendary act of extravagance
won them a mention in the annals of the town: at the climax of a banquet for 40 persons, a Labia, expressing violent contempt for all
material possessions, had commanded the golden plates from which the guests had just finished eating to be thrown out of the window
into the canal. In choosing the extravagant Egyptian queen as the subject of their banquet hall frescoes, the Labia were attempting to
establish their own, admittedly rather tongue-in-cheek relation to tradition” (118). “But all that glitters is not gold… Thus it is said that
the Labia recovered their costly plates by means of underwater nets stretched out in front of the palazzo. As for Cleopatra, chemistry had
proved that pearls do not dissolve in vinegar!” (118) “The naturalist Pliny gives pearls the highest place among all things of value, but he
also accuses the „family of shells‟ of thereby encouraging indulgence and moral degeneracy… Such are the thoughts of a strict moralist
who cherished plainness and severity, the virtues of a male-dominated, highly militarized society. The Romans castigated luxury, selfindulgence
and extravagance” (118).
3. “In Tiepolo‟s day, a Labia widow and her two sons lived in the palace. De Brosses describes here as a woman who, though no longer
young, „was once very beautiful, and had many love affairs.‟ Like the Egyptian queen, she had a famous collection of jewels which she was
proud to show to visitors. Tiepolo would often make flattering allusions to his patrons in his paintings. His majestic portrait of Cleopatra
may therefore bear some resemblance to the lady of the house” (119). “The master and his assistants appear in the background as
discreet observers of the banquet they have painted… The man with the roundish face is said to be Girolamo Mengozzi Colonna (c.
1688-1766), an expert in painting architecture… The entire, sumptuous majesty of the stately room is a masterpiece of trompe l’oeil”
decoration” (120).
4. “The Labia family would have been rich enough to panel their banqueting-hall with real marble if they had wished, or to decorate it with
solid marble columns. It is possible, in any case, that this would have proved cheaper. But they were probably more fond of illusion than
reality. After all, there were marble columns everywhere in Italy, whereas Tiepolo‟s architectural illusions were something quite exclusive:
a highly skilled and baffling artifice which amused visiting spectators… Walls paneled with real marble might have demonstrated wealth,
but they could never have achieved what Tiepolo and Mengozzi enacted with such apparent ease: the extension of space into an
imaginative seascape under a vast evening sky” (121). “Tiepolo‟s contemporaries, it seems, were only too happy to retire from the gray
demands of reality. Angelo-Maria Labia, for example, the widow‟s eldest son, became an abbé- a very worldly ecclesiastic – in order to
escape the troublesome duties of a Venetian noble. As an abbé, he was not required to take office, but could devote his time to renovating
palaces, collecting paintings and commissioning frescoes. His contemporaries spent their time at the theatres, opera houses or the
carnival, and aristocratic tourists from all over Europe came to Venice to partake in what was essentially a non-stop orgy of escapism”
(121).
5. “The table for Cleopatra‟s banquet is laid out in front of a portico, behind which the sails of the Roman fleet are visible. The somewhat
static ordering of the main figures is relaxed by the ironic positioning in the foreground of the little dog and the dwarf, who drags himself
with difficulty up the steps towards the table. Cleopatra‟s exposed décolleté is meant as a reference to the by now advanced stage of her
relationship with Anthony. In contrast to the Melbourne picture, the erotic and witty interpretation of historical events is given
prominence over the festive setting itself” (Eschenfelder 64). “The Labia family were of Spanish origin and had only recently joined the
Venetian patriciate. Tiepolo‟s frescoes reflect the family‟s great desire to create an impression: they are the greatest secular decoration he
ever produced in Venice. The great hall of the palace, which rises up two storeys, is entirely covered by frescoes” (64, 67). “The musicians
on the balcony in the background are an extension of the banqueting scene. Yet, like the fictive architecture, they could just as well be
part of the courtly celebrations taking place in the Palazzo Labia itself” (67).
22

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
E Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
1. “Profound religious questions had been
raised by Newton‟s mechanistic model of the
universe and by Locke‟s empirical
interpretation of the mind. One
eighteenth-century thinker who
addressed the new religious concerns
was the German intellectual Gottfried
Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716). A
student of jurisprudence, an emissary of
diplomacy, and a mathematician as well as
a philosopher, Leibniz shared with Newton
the honor for the invention of calculus”
(Wren 2: 185).
2. “An idealist, Leibniz regarded
philosophy as an interpretation of
divine thought. For him, human reason
was the imitation of the logic of God.
Reason, therefore, had an authority
independent of experience. Opposed alike
to the pantheism of Spinoza and the
empiricism of Locke, Leibniz built up an
interpretation of the universe on a theory of
matter known as „monadology.‟ Monads,
for Leibniz, were centers of force and
consciousness that were capable of action
and perception. The soul was considered
by Leibniz to be a monad that had
consciousness of itself” (185).
3. “Leibniz outlined his religious beliefs in a
text entitled Theodicy (1710). The keynote
of Leibniz‟s thought was optimism.
Believing in a predetermined harmony
between the activities of the human soul
and body, Leibniz taught that of infinite
possible worlds, God had created the best.
In this theory, the soul is absolutely free
from all external constraint, and its
immortality is guaranteed by the fact of its
independence and imperishable
individuality. In theology, Leibniz argued
the rational possibility of revelation and
miracles. In ethics, he believed that
contemplation should be directed to the
beauty and perfection of the future life, and
that piety should be hopeful and serene.
The great moral teachers of the past had
each, in his view, been awarded a share of
truth; with the selection of the best of them,
philosophy became eclectic and continued
progress toward a permanent and satisfying
interpretation of life” (185).
4. “The optimism that Leibniz expressed in
his philosophical speculations about God
and the universe is reflected in eighteenthcentury
architecture. Churches such as
Vierzehnheiligen … abound in light and
gaiety. Somber intensity of feeling is
dissolved into a brilliantly lit interior in
which decorative flights of fancy delight the
imagination of the viewer” (185-6).
F Antoine Watteau. Return from Cythera, 1717-19, oil on canvas
Antoine Watteau/ “Poussinistes” vs. “Rubenistes”/ Rococo art/ fete
galante/ glowing sky with putti/ love conquers all/ rises and falls
analogous to music / theatrical foliage/ flirtatious gestures/ influence
of Rubens
1. Toward the end of the seventeenth
century, the members of the French
Academy “formed two factions over the
issue of drawing versus color: the
„Poussinistes (or conservatives) against
the Rubenistes. The conservatives
defended Poussin‟s view that drawing,
which appealed to the mind, was superior
to color, which appealed to the senses”
(Janson 594). “Jean-Antoine Watteau
(1684-1721), a Flemish artist living in
Paris, epitomizes the French Rococo
style. He created a new type of painting when he submitted his official examination
painting, The Departure from Cythera, for admission to membership in the Royal
Academy of Painting and Sculpture in 1717. The academicians accepted the painting
in a new category, the fete galante, or elegant outdoor entertainment. The Departure
from Cythera depicts a dreamworld in which beautifully dressed couples, abetted by
putti, take leave of the mythical island of love. The verdant landscape would never soil
the characters‟ exquisite satins and velvets, nor would a summer shower ever threaten
them. This kind of idyllic vision, with its overtones of wistful melancholy, had a
powerful attraction in early-eighteenth-century Paris and soon charmed the rest of
Europe” (Stokstad, Art History 810).
2. “Is this fanciful outing ending or about to begin? The French title Pelerinage a l’ile de
Cytherere has been translated as both Pilgrimage to and Pilgrimage on the Isle of
Cythera, since it has never been determined whether or not the bucolic setting
represents the mythical island of Venus. Watteau‟s objective appears to be not to tell a
story but to induce the poignant and wistful evocation of love” (810). “Watteau leads the
eye from right to left along the curving line, which rises and falls like a phrase of music.
Note also how he breaks the rhythm at the highest point with the man holding the
cane. This breaking of rhythm is a technique also used in music.” (Cumming,
Annotated Art 61) “The sky and foliage act as a theatrical backdrop to a stage set-
Watteau was actively involved in the theater and had many actor friends.” (61) In the
picture, a girl “plays with her fan- the way fans were held or moved was part of a secret
language though which lovers (who were often strictly chaperoned) communicated with
each other” (61). “Watteau painted the embarkation for Cythera at least three times.
The first, somewhat stilted version is dated 1710 and hangs in the Stadel Institute in
Frankfurt. The present Berlin picture was executed in 1718 or 1719 for a private
client. It is a slight variation upon a second version, which Watteau submitted as his
presentation piece to the Royal Academy of Arts in Paris, of which he became a member
in 1717. The Academy version now hangs in the Louvre” (Hagen and Hagen, What
Great Paintings Say 3: 102).
4. “This mythic island, sacred to Venus, not only provides the pilgrims with privacy,
with isolation if not solitude, but also with freedom. The pleasure ground has a deep
association with human feelings and passions; there is a melding of nature and the
human. This grove, this sacred isle of love, summons up a pleasurable association
between painting and observer… The place of love offers comfort not just for those
lovers within it, but for all of us, who are potential lovers, watching. We watch because
we are curious and sometimes covetous” (Minor 33-34). “The change within about eight
years from inhibition to relaxation, from deliberation to excitement, is not due solely to
Watteau‟s greater artistic maturity and happy awareness of his own skill, but also to
the general sense of liberation felt after the death of Louis XIV, when hopes were high
for favorable political developments” (Borsch-Supan 66). “Watteau‟s fragile forms and
delicate colors, painted with feathery brushstrokes reminiscent of Rubens, evoke a
mood of reverie and nostalgia. His doll-like men and women provide sharp contrast
with Rubens‟ physically powerful figures or, for that matter, with Poussin‟s idealized
heroes. Watteau‟s art conveys no noble message; rather, it explores the world of
familiar but transitory pleasures” (Fiero, Faith, Reason, and Power 143).
23

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
G Antoine Watteau. Pierrot, called Gilles, c. 1718, oil on
canvas
(Pierrot) Gilles, an Italian actor/ commedia dell‟Arte/ a
portrait of psychological insight/ an early death of
tuberculosis
1. “The more wistful side of Watteau can be seen in his undated Gilles, the
sad Harlequin. The actor, in this case a comic lover, wears his costume, but
does not perform. His pose is frontal, and his arms hang limply at his
sides. His melancholy expression betrays his mood, and is at odds with the
silk costume and pink ribbons on his shoes. Presently between roles, the
actor is „all dressed up with nowhere to go.‟ The blue-gray sky echoes the
figure‟s mood, as do the sunset-colored clouds. End of day, which is
indicated by the sunset, corresponds to the sense that Gilles is at a loss
about what to do next. His lonely isolation is accentuated by the four
figures around him, who seem engaged in animated conversation” (Adams,
Art Across Time 681).
2. “Many of Watteau‟s paintings center on the commedia dell’arte. His
treatment of this Italian theme is all the more remarkable because the
commedia dell‟arte was officially banned in France from 1697 until 1716”
(Janson 595). This work “was probably done as a sign for a café owned by a
friend of the artist who retired from the stage after achieving fame in the
racy role of the clown. The performance has ended, and the actor has
stepped forward to face the audience. The other characters, all highly
individualized, are probably likenesses of friends from the same circle. Yet
the painting is more than a portrait or an advertisement. Watteau
approaches his subject with incomparable human understanding and
artistic genius. Pierrot is lifesize, so that he confronts us as a full human
being, not simply as a stock character. In the process, Watteau transforms
him into Everyman, with whom he evidently identified himself- a merging of
identity basic to the commedia dell‟arte… Like the rest of the actors, except
the doctor on the donkey who looks mischievously at us, he seems lost in
his own thoughts” (595).
4. “The large scale of the picture is surprising, and the onlooker is drawn to
the curiously static centrally placed figure, dressed in theatrical costume,
his arms and hands hanging symmetrically in front of him. His facial
expression seems to combine both mirth and sadness, perhaps suggesting
the transitory nature of pleasure. Shortly after Watteau made this painting
he died of tuberculosis as did the patron and model of the work” (Bolton 74).
5. “Tragically, Watteau died from tuberculosis
when still in his thirties. During his final
illness, while staying with the art dealer Edme-
Francois Gersaint, he painted a signboard for
Gersaint‟s shop. The dealer later wrote,
implausibly, that Watteau had completed the
painting in about a week, working only in the
mornings because of his failing health” (810).
6. “The curious spatial relationship between the
central figure and the other actors can be
explained by supposing that Gilles is standing
on a raised, narrow stage made to look like a
piece of ground. Behind this platform, the other
actors are coming up behind him with the
donkey, and the background is a painted backcloth, strictly speaking a
picture within a picture. This witty interplay links the painting to Gersaint’s
Shop Sign, while the construction of the stage is reminiscent of that in
French Players” (Borsch-Supan 62). “A comparison with Hyacinthe
Rignaud‟s Louis XIV in Armor of 1701 makes this work… seem almost like a
calculated insult to royalty. The comedy of the role of Pierrot turns to
dignity, and the symmetry of the large format engenders a sense of majesty
based on the nature of humanity” (57).
24
H Francois Boucher. Cupid a Captive,
1754, oil on canvas
Francois Boucher/ Rococo sense of sensual
playfulness/ pastel colors/ artificial
treatment of nature/ Madame de
Pompadour
1. “The artist most closely
associated today with
Parisian Rococo painting is
Francois Boucher (1703-
1770), who never met
Watteau. In 1721,
Boucher, the son of a minor
painter, entered the
workshop of an engraver to
support himself as he
attempted to win favor at
the Academy. The young
man‟s skill drew the
attention of a devotee of
Watteau, who hired
Boucher to reproduce
Watteau‟s paintings in his
collection, an event that
firmly established the
direction of Boucher‟s
career” (Stokstad, Art
History 812).
2. “After studying at the French Academy in Rome from
1727 to 1731, Boucher settled in Paris and became an
academician. Soon his life and career were intimately
bound up with two women: The first was his artistically
talented wife, Marie-Jeanne Buseau, who was a
frequent model as well as a studio assistant to her
husband. The other was Louis XV‟s mistress, Madame
de Pompadour, who became his major patron and
supporter. Pompadour was an amateur artist herself
and took lessons from Boucher in printmaking. After
Boucher received his first royal commission in 1735, he
worked almost continuously to decorate the royal
residences at Versailles and Fontainebleau. In 1755,
he was made chief inspector at the Gobelins Tapestry
Manufactory, and he provided designs to it and to the
Sevres porcelain and Beauvais tapestry manufactories,
all of which produced furnishings for the king” (812).
3. “As a promoter of moral painting, the French critic
Denis Diderot despised Boucher. In his Salon reviews
of 1765 he wrote: „I don‟t know what to say about this
man. Degradation of taste, color, composition,
character, expression, and drawing have kept pace with
moral depravity‟” (Minor 195). “Many critics have
dismissed or denounced Boucher for his „frivolous‟
subject matter… but it takes a narrow and puritanical
nature to miss the importance of these paintings” (195).
“Boucher‟s brushwork is as abandoned as the mood of
his paintings. Not that he was messy or thoughtless in
his technique; he simply understood that painting can
bewitch the spectator with its sheer audacity, its
exuberant love of the act of fashioning paints into
luxurious forms” (195). “Neither the King nor his
mistress were lazy, but they understood the erotic and
pleasurable charge of indolence” (195).

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
I Jean-Honore Fragonard. The Swing, 1766, oil on canvas
Jean-Honore Fragonard/ an “intrigue” picture for Baron St. Julien/
three graces and Cupid‟s warning/ Rococo touches of sensuality and
playfulness/ artificial lighting
1. “When the mother of young Jean-Honore Fragonard (1732-
1806) brought her son to Boucher‟s studio around 1747-1748,
the busy court artist recommended that the boy first study the
basics of painting with his contemporary and friend, Jean-
Simeon Chardin. Within a few months, Fragonard returned
with some small paintings done on his own, and Boucher
gladly welcomed him as an apprentice-assistant at no charge
to his family. Boucher encouraged the boy to enter the
competition for the Prix de Rome, which Fragonard won in
1752. Fragonard returned to Paris in 1761, but not until
1765 was he finally accepted into the Royal Academy.
Fragonard began catering to the tastes of an aristocratic
clientele, and by 1770 he began to fill the vacuum left by
Boucher‟s death as a decorator of interiors” (Stokstad, Art
History 812-3).
2. “When he was 35 years old, he decided to work as an independent artist producing
work for the art dealers and rich collectors of the ancien regime, who wanted intimate
work for their salons and boudoirs. He had enormous artistic and financial success,
painting delightful airy scenes of gallantry and frivolity that embody the spirit of the
Rococo. However, the Revolution of 1789 and the new taste for Neoclassicism changed
the world in which he had flourished. He died impoverished, unnoticed, and out of
fashion” (Cumming, Great Artists 58).This painting “was commissioned by the libertine
Baron de St. Julien. He initially gave the order to a painter of historical subjects, Doyen.
Spelling out his requirements, the Baron said, „I should like you to paint Madame [his
mistress] seated on a swing being pushed by a bishop.‟ Shocked by the request, Doyen
refused the commission… Fragonard accepted the work enthusiastically, but replaced the
bishop with the girl‟s husband” (58-9).
3. “The stone statue of Cupid catches the sunlight and seems to have come alive. He
raises a finger to his lips as if warning us to keep the secret of the Baron hidden in the
bushes… Around the base of the statue of Cupid the Three Graces appear as a classical
relief. In Greek mythology, the Graces were attendants of Venus, the goddess of love.
Fragonard half-hides them, as if to emphasize his lack of interest in the art of classical
antiquity” (59). “Fragonard mastered the pleasing effect of dappled sunlight, which
illuminates many of his works… The slipper flying through the air is a brilliant touch,
which adds a focus of visual attention and sums up the playfulness of the subject… The
fantastic trees owe more to the artist‟s memories of his childhood and his student days
that they do to observation from nature. Fragonard was raised in the lush, flower-filled
region of Grasse- the center of the perfume industry. As a student in Italy, he was more
excited by the luxurious pleasure gardens at Tivoli, where he spent the summer of 1760,
than he was by antique sculpture” (58-9).
4. “There is another place of pleasure, the locus uberimus, from the Latin word for the
rich and fertile. The Swing by Jean-Honore Fragonard presents us with a typical instance.
An oddly radiant light wells up within the left-hand corner and enchants this overly
luxuriant glade. Nature explodes with leaves and flowers. As if the force of nature were
somewhat demented, trees erupt violently from the ground and twist tortuously.
Certainly, not everything is charmed here; there is more than a hint of perversity… The
statues, the rhythmically rocking young woman, a voyeur, and a yammering lap dog
create a disturbing, fertile excitement and sensibility” (Minor 35, 37). “The subject of this
painting was suggested by the Baron de St. Julien, who commissioned it and who is
depicted in it as the rakish voyeur. Fragonard skillfully frames the scene in foliage and
uses all sorts of detail to add tension: the slipper which has flown off, the slightly frayed
and slightly twisted ropes, and the tortuously curving branches” (37). “Whether or not the
young lady is aware of her lover‟s presence, her coy gesture and the irreverent behavior of
the ménage a trios (lover, mistress, and cleric) create a mood of erotic intrigue similar to
that found in the comic operas of this period, as well as in the pornographic novel, which
developed as a genre in eighteenth-century France… Although Fragonard immortalized
the union of wealth, privilege, and pleasure enjoyed by the upper classes of the eighteenth
century, he captured a spirit of sensuous abandon that has easily outlived the particulars
of time, place, and social class” (Fiero, Faith, Reason, and Power 145-146).
25
J Voltaire and the Pursuit of
Happiness
1. “The pursuit of happiness and the
belief in its attainment permeate the
paintings of the French artist Jean-
Honore Fragonard (1732-1806). In The
Swing (1766) Fragonard depicts, with
delicious wit, a lovers‟ assignation. This
optimism was assailed by the leading
French intellectual of the
Englightenment, Francois-Marie Arouet
(1694-1778), who preferred to be called
Voltaire. Known for his penetrating wit
and brilliant style, Voltaire survived a
turbulent career that resulted in two
periods of incarceration in the Bastille
and in three years of exile in England”
(Wren 2: 193-4).
2. “A champion of the principle of reason,
Voltaire reacted sharply against the
optimistic philosophical theories of
Liebniz. In his satirical novel Candide
(1759), Voltaire seized upon Leibniz‟s
axiom that this was the best of all
possible worlds. Candide, the central
character of the novel, is a youthful
disciple of Doctor Pangloss, who is a
disciple of Leibniz. Candide and a
beautiful young woman, Cunegund, fall
in love, but are separated by her parents,
who consider Candide too lowly in birth
to court their highborn daughter.
Stumbling through a world of ignorance,
cruelty, and violence, Candide,
Cunegund, and Pangloss each endure
beatings, torture, rape, imprisonment,
slavery, disease, and disfigurement. At
the end of their misadventures, the
much-sobered trio retires to the shores of
the Pronpontis, there to discover that the
secret to happiness was „to cultivate one‟s
garden‟” (194). Voltaire “hated… the
arbitrary despotic rule of kings, the
selfish privileges of the nobility and the
church, religious intolerance, and above
all, the injustice of the ancien regime (the
„old order‟)… Voltaire believed that the
human race could never be happy until
the traditional obstructions to the
progress of the human mind and welfare
were removed… This conviction paved the
way for a revolution in France that
Voltaire never intended, and he probably
never would have approved of it. He was
not convinced that „all men are created
equal,‟ the credo of Jean-Jacques
Rousseau, Thomas Jefferson, and the
American Declaration of Independence”
(Kleiner, Mamiya, and Tansey 837).
“More than any of the philosophes,
Voltaire extolled the traditions of non-
Western cultures, faiths, and moralities”
(Fiero, Faith, Power, and Reason 121).

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
K Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun. Marie Antoinette and her Children, 1787, oil on canvas
Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun/ Marie Antoinette/ emphasis on / motherhood/ Rococo love of sentiment
1. Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun (1755-1842) “painted several portraits of Marie Antoinette, the Austrian-born
queen of Louis XVI… Vigée-Lebrun befriended monarchs and their families, and benefited from their
patronage. Her 1788 portrait of Marie Antoinette and her Children depicts the Queen of France in an elegant,
regal setting, oblivious to the social, political, and economic unrest among her subjects that would erupt the
following year and culminate in the French Revolution. The variety of rich textures- silks, laces, and brocades,
and Marie Antoinette‟s enormous feathered hat- emphasize the wealth and position of the sitters. At the same
time, the Queen shows her ease with motherhood. One daughter nestles against her shoulder and the toddler
squirms on her lap. The boy introduces a somber note as he pulls aside the crib cover to reveal the empty
bed, denoting the death of one of Marie Antoinette‟s children” (Adams, Art Across Time 684). “In 1783, Vigée-
Lebrun was elected to one of the four places in the French Academy available to women. As the favorite
painter to the queen, Vigée-Lebrun escaped from Paris with her daughter on the eve of the Revolution of 1789
and fled to Rome. After a very successful self-exile working in Italy, Austria, Russia, and England, the artist
finally resettled in Paris in 1804 at the invitation of Napoleon I and again became popular with Parisian art
patrons. Over her long career, she painted around 800 portraits in a vibrant style that changed very little over
the decades” (Stokstad, Art History 935).
2. “Her portrait of Marie-Antoinette en chemise raised a few eyebrows at the Salon in 1783; indeed, under pressure she withdrew the
painting from the exhibition. Because this expensive, casual clothing- known as a chemise en robe- was associated by many with lingerie,
the artist was perceived as having broken rules of decorum. But we know that the Queen loved this relaxed, even intimate, portrait of
herself. With the cult of sensibility has done, perhaps without either the Queen or her artist being very conscious of the fact, was to
undermine, or compromise, the power of the monarchical portrait” (Minor 232). “Vigee-Lebrun did not cast her subjects as goddesses, but
she imparted to them a chic sweetness and artless simplicity. These talents earned her the equivalent of over $200,000 a year and
allowed her an independence uncommon among eighteenth-century women” (Fiero, Faith, Reason, and Power 145).
L Jean-Simeon Chardin. Grace at Table, 1740, oil on canvas
Jean-Simeon Chardin/ environment free of corrupt society/ discarded toys vs. properly set table/ art of
instruction and moral uplift in a middle class home
1. “The son of a furniture maker, Jean-Baptiste-Simeon Chardin (1699-1779) probably originally intended to
work in his father‟s trade. In 1718, however, he was apprenticed to a painter, and being quite gifted, soon
acquired the basics of this craft. At age twenty-eight he presented two paintings to the Royal Academy hoping
to gain admission. The academicians were so dazzled by these works- especially The Ray Fish, which
represents an enormous, glistening, disemboweled ray fish suspended from a hook and a cat tiptoeing toward
the foreground over open oysters- that Chardin was immediately accepted as a full member” (Govignon 195).
“Chardin specialized first in small still lifes of kitchen utensils and food laid out for the cook. Around 1733 he
began to paint genre subjects- scenes from everyday life- starting with the charming Lady Sealing a Letter,
hoping to widen his repertory and win new clients. Thereafter he produced many such scenes showing, for
example, maids doing the laundry or a governess helping children dress for school. His paintings of children
are especially poetic, showing them as rather grave young adults, completely absorbed in their games” (195).
2. “A gentle sentiment prevails in all of his pictures, an emotion not contrived and artificial but born of the
painter‟s honesty, insight, and sympathy. (It is interesting that this picture was owned by King Louis XV, the
royal personification of the Rococo in his life and tastes.)” (Kleiner, Mamiya, and Tansey 842). “Everyone knows the story-or legend?- of
how he was prodded into painting human forms. One day he heard his friend Aved refuse a commission of four hundred livres to paint a
portrait; Chardin, accustomed to small fees, marveled at the refusal; Avel answered, „You think a portrait is as easy to paint as a
sausage?‟ It was a cruel jibe, but useful; Chardin had confined his subjects too narrowly, and would soon have satiated his clients with
dishes and food. He resolved to paint figures, and discovered in himself a genius of sympathetic portrayal that he had allowed to sleep”
(Durant, Age of Voltaire 318).
3. “In Saying Grace (at the Salon it was called Bénédicité, which is the first word of Grace, from the Latin benedicite), a mother pauses in
the process of ladling out the meal of her two young children, as the smaller of these falters over the simple prayer, glancing up to her for
assistance. His sister looks on, not without malice, at his difficulty. The legend on Lepicie‟s engraving of 1744 suggests that the little boy
is garbling his prayer as fast as possible, because his mind is more on his food. Again the setting is a simple bourgeois, living-room,
comfortable with its damask tablecloth and a pair of good upholstered chairs; the brazier at the right „answers‟ the pug and work-box in
the companion picture” The Industrious Mother (Conisbee 162-163). “Although he was unsurpassed as a still-life painter, he always
regretted that his father lacked the means to provide him with a humanistic education and therefore prepare him for history painting, the
most prestigious of all forms of art in the Baroque and Rococo periods” (Minor 252). “The values of simplicity, truth, and naturalness were
much promoted in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as an antidote to the corruption of the court and the city. The disasters of
the final years of Louis XIV‟s reign, followed shortly by a catastrophic stock market crash in Paris in 1720, encouraged many to seek
modest values and personal virtue. The work ethic promoted by the middle class went hand in hand with a strong attachment to family
and the pursuit of prosperity” (262-263).
26

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
M Jean Simeon Chardin. The Copper Water Urn,
c. 1734, oil on panel
still life of solemn domesticity
1. “These now universally acclaimed
pictures found a very limited market
and brought Chardin just enough
francs to maintain him in contented
simplicity. He could not haggle with
customers; he let his pictures go for
almost any offered fee; and as he
worked slowly and laboriously, he wore
himself out in relative poverty, while
Boucher used himself up in affluence.
When his first wife died, after only four
years of marriage, he let his rooms and
affairs fall into a baccalaureate
disorder. His friends prevailed upon
him to remarry, if
only to have a woman‟s deft and patient hand restore some order
to his ménage. He hesitated for nine years, then took to wife the
widow Marguerite Pouget, in literally a marriage of convenience.
She brought him a moderate dowry, including a house that she
owned at 13 Rue Princesse. He moved into it, and his poverty
ended. She was a good woman and a solicitous wife. He learned
to love her gratefully” (Durant, Age of Voltaire 318-9).
2. “To further finance him the King gave him (1752) a pension of
five hundred livres, and the Academy (1754) appointed him
treasurer. Soon afterward it engaged him to place the pictures
submitted to its Salons; he was thoroughly un-suited to this task,
but his wife helped him. In 1756 a friendly engraver, Charles
Nicolas Cochin II, persuaded Marigny to give Chardin a
comfortable apartment in the Louvre” (319). “Chardin tended to
work on a small scale, meticulously and slowly. His still lifes
consisted of a few simple objects that were to be enjoyed for their
subtle differences of shape and texture, not for any virtuoso
performance, complexity of composition, or moralizing content”
(Stokstad, Art History 932-3).
3. “For all that Chardin‟s signature is like a graffito on the wall,
this is not illusionistic painting; the brown thong on the handle of
the pan is suggested, not defined, an angular and twisting gesture
of the paint-loaded brush. Placed firmly as these solidly painted
objects are on the floor at the end of their kitchen, they take on a
presence even more immediate that the utensils we have seen
artfully arranged at eye level on their stone ledges. Somehow the
spectator can identify with this space, could walk in on this small
area of floor. It seems to require but one step for a maidservant to
enter Chardin‟s pictorial world, and to confirm the already vivid
existence of these vessels with use” (Conisbee 105).
4. Chardin “arranged his shadows carefully and had a strong
discernment and awareness of tactile values- of the apparent
touchability of the objects that he painted. There is nothing
unusually beautiful about the specimens that he selects, but there
is a strong sense of substance and geometry, as if he were aware
that lying beneath these humble forms were the principles of the
cone, the cylinder, and the sphere- the basic geometries of nature.
Just the same, for all their careful structure, Chardin‟s still lifes
appear unstudied and natural” (Minor 253). “His technique was to
prime his canvases with a priming, which was then covered by
some dense paint, such as a mixture of white lead with reddish
brown… Thus he painted from dark to light, adding the lightest
part toward the end. His final pass over the painting would be with
a varnish that would „pull it together‟ ” (253).
27
N Denis Diderot
1. “Chardin‟s work was praised by Denis Diderot, a leading
Enlightenment figure whom many consider the father of modern
art criticism. Diderot‟s most notable contribution was editing
the Encyclopedie (1751-1765), a seventeen-volume
compendium of knowledge and opinion to which many of the
major Enlightenment thinkers contributed. In 1759, Diderot
began to write reviews of the official Salon for a periodic
newsletter for wealthy subscribers. Diderot believed that it was
art‟s proper function to „inspire virtue and purify manners.‟ He
therefore praised artists such as Chardin and criticized the
adherents of the Rococo” (Stokstad 933).
2. “Diderot‟s highest praise went to Jean-Baptiste Greuze
(1725-1805)- which is hardly surprising, because Grueze‟s major
source of inspiration came from the kind of drame bourgeois
(„middle-class drama‟) that Diderot had inaugurated in France in
1757. In addition to comedy and tragedy, Diderot felt there
should be a „middle tragedy‟ that taught useful lessons to the
public with clear, simple stories of ordinary life” (933).
O Jean-Jacques Rousseau
1. “The primacy of reason was challenged by the French
philosopher and author Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778).
Rousseau‟s thought ran counter to that of Voltaire and other
Enlightenment thinks. To these thinkers, recent advances in
science and technology were regarded as proof of the superiority
of the rational intellect over instinct and emotion, while future
advances in science and technology were expected to provide the
basis for material progress. Material progress, in turn, was
viewed by most Enlightenment thinkers as the means by which
morality and happiness could be increased among individuals”
(Wren 2: 197-8).
2. “Rousseau, in contrast, was skeptical about material
progress, which he regarded as destructive of an individual‟s
moral well-being and happiness. Rousseau, though never
doubting the attainments of the human intellect, regarded
science and technology as the products of complex civilizations.
In Rousseau‟s view, complex civilizations corrupted, rather than
improved, individuals, by introducing luxury, avarice, sloth, and
decadence. Individuals, according to Rousseau, became the
victims rather than the masters of machines; they became part
of communities that promoted war to further their accumulation
of wealth and their acquisition of territory; and they surrendered
their independence to leaders who developed elaborate systems
of government and law. Rousseau was convinced that, with the
advent of complex civilizations, individuals had ceased to
cherish their original sentiments of liberty and equality and had
become alienated from their natural instincts of kindness,
charity, and pity” (198).
3. “Rousseau expounded many of his major ideas in his
Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality Among Men
(1754). In this work, Rousseau defines the natural state of the
individual prior to the establishment of political societies.
Rousseau argues that people living according to purely natural
impulses are motivated by the principle of self-preservation,
moderated by natural pity or compassion, and are incapable of
pride, hatred, falsehood, and vice. He further argues that
society, because of its creation of inequalities in property,
wealth, and education, has corrupted the natural good” (198).

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
P On Educating Children
1. “Although he never married and he
placed his own children in orphanages,
the French-Swiss philosopher Jean-
Jacques Rousseau formulated a
behavioral program of childhood
education that affected all French schools
after the Revolution of 1789” (Stokstad,
Art History 935).
2. “Believing that children were inherently
good until society corrupted them and
broke their naturally independent,
inquisitive spirits, Rousseau advised
mothers to breast-feed their babies
themselves, dress them in loose clothing
with no bonnet, wash them in unheated
water, give them freedom to crawl about,
and never rock them, which Rousseau
considered harmful. As boys grew, they
were to be taught to value nature, human
liberty, and personal valor and virtue.
This environment would inevitably
produce a citizen committed to political
freedom and civic duty. Girls were to be
educated only as needed for their futures
as wives and mothers. Once married,
women were to stay at home, out of the
public eye, caring for their households
and children, which Rousseau saw as „the
manner of living that nature and reason
prescribe for the sex‟” (935).
R The French Salon
1. “In the eighteenth century, the
salon became the center of Parisian
society and taste. The typical salon
was the creation of a charming,
financially comfortable, welleducated,
and witty hostess (the
salonniere) in her forties. She
provided good food, a well-set table, and
music for people of achievement in
different fields who visited her hotel. The
guests engaged in the arts of
conversation, and in social and
intellectual interchange” (Adams, Art
Across Time 675).
2. “In the seventeenth century, the most
important salon had been that of
Madame de Rambouillet, who wished to
exert a „civilizing‟ influence on society. By
the next century, the salon was a fact of
Paris social life, and one in which women
played the dominant role. Among the
salonnieres were women of significant
accomplishments in addition to
hostessing. These included writers
(Madames de LaFayette, de Sevigne, and
de Stael, and Mademoiselle de Scudery), a
scientist (Madame de Chatelet), and the
painter Elisabeth Vigee-Lebrun” (675).
Q William Hogarth. Breakfast Party, from the Marriage a la Mode
series, c. 1745, oil on canvas
William Hogarth/ satire of arranged marriages/ suggestion of erotic
activities/ steward with unpaid bills/ part of a series of moralizing
narratives
1. “A different expression of English Rococo is found in the witty, biting commentary of
William Hogarth (1697-1764). Influenced in part by Flemish and Dutch genre paintings,
he took contemporary manners and social conventions as the subjects of his satire. His
series of six paintings entitled Marriage a la Mode from the 1740s pokes fun at
hypocritical commitments to the marriage contract” (Adams, Art Across Time 686). “The
architecture reflects the Neoclassical Palladian style of eighteenth-century England, but
Rococo details fill the interior. The costume frills, for example, echo the French version of
the style. The elaborate chandelier and the wall designs are characteristic of Rococo
fussiness. On the mantelpiece, the bric-a-brac of chinoiserie reflects the eighteenthcentury
interest in Far Eastern exotic objects, as well as referring to a frivolous lifestyle.
They are contrasted with the august pictures of saints in the next room.” (687). “Cupid,
on the other hand, is depicted blowing the bagpipes, which, as in Bruegel‟s Peasant
Dance, signify lust. The dangers of sexual excess, which Hogarth satirizes, are
underscored by locating Cupid among ruins, foreshadowing the inevitable ruin of the
marriage” (687). “Hogarth‟s father was a teacher, from whom his son learned Latin and
Greek. He also opened a Latin-speaking coffee house that went bankrupt. As a result, he
spent three years in debtors‟ prison, until Parliament passed an Act freeing all debtors.
This experience contributed to the artist‟s fierce opposition to social injustice and
hypocrisy. In 1752, Hogarth published his view on art in Analysis of Beauty, which, like
the etching, states his anti-Academic position… He urges people to look at nature and to
themselves, rather than to the plaster casts of traditional art schools, for „what we feel‟”
(687).
2. “In 1751 Hogarth announced that he would sell at auction, at a given hour in his
studio, the oil paintings that he had made for Marriage a la Mode; but he warned picture
dealers to stay away. Only one person appeared, who bid £126 for the pictures and their
frames. Hogarth let them go at this price, but privately raged at what he rated a shameful
failure. In 1797 these paintings bought £1,381; today they are among the most highly
prized possessions of London‟s National Gallery” (Durant, Age of Voltaire 221). “Like most
moralists he was not himself immaculate; he had borne without horror the company of
drunkards and prostitutes…The art critics, collectors, and dealers of the time
acknowledged neither Hogarth‟s ability as an artist nor his truth as a satirist. They
charged him with picturing only the dregs of English life. They taunted him with having
turned to popular prints through inability to paint successful portraits or historical
scenes; and they condemned his drawing as careless and inaccurate” (219, 222).
3. “Hogarth‟s favorite device was to make a
series of narrative paintings and prints, in a
sequence like chapters in a book or scenes
in a play, that followed a character or group
of characters in their encounters with some
social evil” (Kleiner, Mamiya, and Tansey
843). In his Breakfast Scene, “the moment
portrayed is just past noon; husband and
wife are tired after a long night spent in
separate pursuits. The music and the
musical instrument on the overturned chair
in the foreground and the disheveled
servant straightening the chairs and tables
in the room at the back indicate that the
wife had stayed at home for an evening of cards and music making. She stretches with a
mixture of sleepiness and coquettishness, casting a glance toward her young husband,
who clearly had been away from the house for a night of suspicious business. Still
dressed in hat and social finery, he slumps in discouraged boredom on a chair near the
fire. His hands are thrust deep into the empty money-pockets of his breeches, while his
wife‟s small dog sniffs inquiringly at a lacy woman‟s cap protruding from his coat pocket.
A steward, his hand full of unpaid bills, raises his eye to Heaven in despair” (843).
“Paintings of religious figures hang on the upper wall of the distant room. This
demonstration of piety is countered by the curtained canvas at the end of the row that,
undoubtedly, depicts an erotic subject” (843).
28

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
S Thomas Gainsborough. Mr. And Mrs. Andrews, c. 1748-50, oil on canvas
Thomas Gainsborough/ Mr. Andrews as a country gentleman with a love of hunting/ Mrs. Andrews as a
decorative feature/ ripe ears of corn/ little tree between two larger tress/ an enclosure in the distance/
asymmetrical composition
1. “Portraiture remained the only constant source of income for English painters. Here, too
eighteenth-century England produced a style that differed from Continental traditions.
Hogarth was a pioneer in this field as well. The greatest master, however, was Thomas
Gainsborough (1727-1788), who began by painting landscapes but ended as the favorite
portraitist of British high society. His early paintings, such as Robert Andrews and his Wife,
have a lyrical charm that is not always found in his later pictures… The landscape is
derived from Ruisdael and his school but has a sunlit, hospitable air never achieved (or
desired) by the Dutch masters. The casual grace of the two figures, which affect an air of
naturalness, indirectly recalls Watteau‟s style. The newlywed couple- she dressed in the
fashionable attire of the day, he armed with a rifle to denote his status as a country squire
(hunting was a privilege of wealthy landowners) – do not till the soil themselves. The
painting nevertheless conveys the gentry‟s closeness to the land, from which the English
derived much of their sense of national identity” (Janson 600). “An entry in the parish register of the small Suffolk town of Sudbury
records that Robert Andrews married Frances Mary Carter there on 10 November 1748. He was 22 years of age, his bride 16. Also newly
wedded, albeit one year younger than the bridegroom he was to paint, was Thomas Gainsborough himself. In a London chapel notorious
for its secret weddings, he had taken the pregnant Margaret Burr to be his lawful wedded wife” (Hagen and Hagen, What Great Paintings
Say 1:111).
2. “Ripe ears of corn are a fitting fertility symbol for a wedding portrait. Gainsborough‟s realistic landscape also holds a number of other
symbolic references to the couple‟s consummate marriage and hope of issue: a little tree grows between two larger one on the right; the
man‟s casually lowered shotgun and the bird lying in his wife‟s lap may also be seen as discreet erotic allusions” (111). “Feelings had little
sway in the matter of marriage between two wealthy families. The bride was often promised at a very tender age and, like Frances Mary
Carter, married off at the age of 15 or 16. She was little more than a pawn in a business deal… Frances Carter was undoubtedly an
excellent match. The estate of Auberies, upon which Gainsborough has painted the couple, was probably part of her dowry” (114). “The
view from the garden bench gives the appearance of a boundless idyll- not unlike the ideal parkland proposed by the most famous, 18 th
century landscape gardeners. It even includes an occasional cluster of trees: aesthetically indispensable for the interruption of vistas that
would otherwise seem too wide, or too symmetrical. However, functionality in all its forms was considered inappropriate in one of the new
English parks. Cornfields and herds of sheep, not to mention the byre just visible in the background on the left, would be quite out of
place. Gainsborough, it must be concluded, has not painted Mr. And Mrs. Andrews in a park, but on a farm” (115).
3. “In the middle distance a flock of sheep is shown in a neatly enclosed field, and the cattle are separately enclosed a field with a wooden
shelter on the far left of the painting. This is further evidence of the Andrew‟s modern approach to farming. Enclosure farming was an
innovation of the 18 th century that led to more intensive cultivation. Previously, sheep and other livestock were allowed to wander freely
over the same common land, a system that proved to be detrimental to the health of the livestock as well as damaging to crops”
(Cumming, Annotated Art 67). Gainsborough “began his career imitating Jacob van Ruisdael” (Minor 282). He “had made many copies of
landscapes by Rusidael and even had repaired works by the Dutch master” (282).
4. In this work, “the young couple are depicted at their Suffolk estate of Auberies, near Sudbury, at the point where the parkland meets
the cultivated land; the church of All Saints where they were married is in the background. The way in which the figures are set in front
of the landscape derives from Watteau; in later works Gainsborough would integrate his sitters more closely into their landscape settings”
(284). “Gainsborough‟s image of Robert Andrews and his wife depicts the modern landholder as one whose tenancy is beneficial. The
bright, organized landscape to the right attests to the Andrews‟ diligence as proprietors whose concern is in the best interest of cultivation
and conservation. This somewhat provincial couple- much too well dressed actually to work on the farm- are shown in all their selfsatisfaction
against the darkening clouds of an English autumnal afternoon” (284). “We must not imagine that they sat together under a
tree while Gainsborough set up his easel among the sheaves of corn; their costumes were most likely painted from dressed-up artist‟s
mannequins, which may account for their doll-like appearance, and the landscape would have been studied separately” (Langmuir 284).
5. “This kind of picture, commissioned by people „who lived in rooms which were neat but not spacious‟, in Ellis Waterhouse‟s happy
phrase about Gainsborough‟s contemporary Arthur Devis, was a specialty of painters who were not „out of the top drawer‟. The sitters, or
their mannequin stand-ins, are posed in „genteel attitudes‟ derived from manuals of manners. The nonchalant Mr. Andrews, fortunate
possessor of a game license, has his gun under his arm; Mrs. Andrews, ramrod straight and neatly composed, may have been meant to
hold a book, or, it has been suggested, a bird which her husband has shot. In the event, a reserved space left in her lap has not been
filled in with any identifiable object” (284). “Out of these conventional ingredients Gainsborough has composed the most tartly lyrical
picture in the history of art. Mr. Andrew‟s satisfaction in his well-kept farmlands is as nothing to the intensity of the painter‟s feeling for
the gold and green of fields and copses, the supple curves of fertile land meeting the stately clouds. The figures stand out brittle against
that glorious yet ordered bounty. But how marvelously the acid blue hoped skirt is deployed, almost, but not quite, rhyming with the
curved bench back, the pointy silk shoes in sly communion with the bench feet, while Mr. Andrews‟s substantial shoes converse with tree
roots. (The faithful gun dog had better watch out for his unshod paws.) More rhymes and assonances link the lines of guns, thighs, dog,
calf, coat; a coat tail answers the hanging ribbon of a sunhat; something jaunty in the husband‟s tricorn catches the corner of his wife‟s
eye. Deep affection and naïve artifice combine to create the earliest successful depiction of a truly English idyll” (284-285).
29

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
T Thomas Gainsborough. Mrs. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, 1787, oil on canvas
an elegant portrait inspired by van Dyck/ a pastoral, “natural” setting/ David Hume‟s “natural man”
1. “A number of British patrons… remained committed to the kind of portraiture Van Dyck had brought to
England in the 1620s, which had featured more informal poses against natural vistas. Thomas Gainsborough
achieved great success with this mode when he moved to Bath in 1759 to cater to the rich and fashionable
people who had recently begun to go there in great numbers. A good example of this mature style is the
Portrait of Mrs. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, which shows the professional singer and wife of a celebrated
playwright seated informally outdoors” (Stokstad, Art History 933-4).
2. With the aid of his light, Rococo palette and feathery brushwork, Gainsborough displays an ability to
integrate his sitter into the landscape. “The effect is especially noticeable in the way her windblown hair
matches the tree foliage overhead. The work thereby manifests one of the new values of the Enlightenment:
the emphasis on nature and the natural as the sources of goodness and beauty” (934).
3. “Elizabeth Linley‟s beauty and exceptional soprano voice brought her professional success in concerts and
festivals in Bath and London. After marrying Sheridan in 1773 she left her career to support and participate
in her husband‟s activities as politician, playwright, and orator. Sheridan‟s work was immensely popular, and
his witty plays, A School for Scandal and The Rivals, are a beloved part of today‟s theatrical repertoire. Mrs.
Sheridan is shown here at the age of thirty-one, a mature and elegant woman. Merged into the landscape, her
gracious form bends to the curve of the trees behind her. Light plays as quickly and freely across her dress as it does across the clouds
and the sky. The distinct textures of rocks, foliage, silk, and hair are unified by the strong, animated rhythms of Gainsborough‟s brush.
The freely painted, impressionistic style of Mrs. Sheridan‟s costume and the windblown landscape reflect the strong romantic component
in Gainsborough‟s artistic temperament. However, his primary focus remains on his sitter‟s face and on her personality. Her chin and
mouth are firm, definite, and sculptural, and her heavily drawn eyebrows give her a steady, composed, and dignified expression. There is
a hint of romantic melancholy in her eyes, with their slightly indirect gaze” (Anderson 152). “Thomas Gainsborough prospered greatly from
the portrait trade, but both he and his patrons preferred a light and airy version of the sentimental portrait, what Joshua Reynolds in not
very complimentary terms called „fancy pictures‟. Because he objected to the great height at which pictures were hung in the Royal
Academy, Gainsborough quarreled with the organizers of the exhibition in 1784 and refused thereafter to participate, preferring to show
his paintings at his own home, where he had control over the lighting and display. He insisted upon a close view: his conception of a
picture was of something delicate and fine, not ponderous and dense” (Minor 235).
U Sir Joshua Reynolds. Mrs. Sarah Siddons as the Tragic Muse, 1784, oil on canvas
Sir Joshua Reynolds/ Discourses on Art/Sarah Siddons/ portrait in the grand style (or “grand manner”
portraiture)
1. “While the burgeoning middle classes in France and England were embracing the work of Greuze and
Hogarth, their upper-class contemporaries continued to commission flattering portraits. The leading portrait
painter in late-eighteenth century England was probably Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792), the inaugural
president of the Royal Academy (established in 1768). His Fifteen Discourses to the Royal Academy (1769-
1790) set out his theories on art: Artists should follow the rules derived from studying the great masters of the
past, especially those who worked in the classical tradition; art should generalize to create the universal rather
than the particular; and the highest kind of art is history painting” (Stokstad, Art History 933). “Because
British patrons preferred portraits of themselves to scenes of classical history, Reynolds attempted to elevate
portraiture to the level of history painting by giving it a historical or mythological veneer” (933). “We now tend
to prefer the fresher brush of his rival Gainsborough to Reynold‟s contrivances. A restless and indiscriminate
experimenter with media and pigments, imitating the surface effects of Old Master paintings without an
understanding of their methods, he saw his pictures fade, flake and crack, so that portraits „died‟ before their
sitters. Even his contemporaries protested at his technical shortcomings. Yet the more we look at Reynolds,
in the prodigious variety which Gainsborough rightly envied, the more we see that he indeed achieved what he
defined as‟ that one great idea, which gives to painting its true dignity… of speaking to the heart.” (Langmuir
316).
2. Unlike Reynolds, “Gainsborough did little reading, had few intellectual interests, shunned the circle of wits that gathered around
[Samuel] Johnson.” (Durant, Rousseau and Revolution 757) “Reynolds was a man; of the world, ready to make the obeisances required for
social acceptance; Gainsborough was a passionate individualists who raged at the sacrifices demanded of his personality and his art as
the price of success” (755). “Reynolds‟ Grand Style did not exclude the sense of play and sentiment typical of the age. Sarah Siddons was
the most famous tragic actress of her time, especially renowned for her portrayal of Lady Macbeth in Shakespeare‟s play Macbeth… Yet
her pose here is nonchalant- it gives an appearance of being effortless or unposed. One of the stories associated with the painting tells us
that Sarah Siddons, late for her sitting, rushed into Reynolds‟ studio, threw herself on the throne, removed her bonnet, rested her head
momentarily in her hand, then turned to the painter and asked, „How shall I sit?‟ „Just as you are,‟ Sir Joshua replied. Mrs. Siddons also
related to another painter that the pose came from an idle moment when Reynolds was preparing some colors and she happened to turn
and look at another of the artist‟s paintings hanging on the wall. He saw the expression and pose, and asked that she hold it” (Minor
233).
30

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
Sir Joshua Reynolds. Mrs. Sarah Siddons as the
Tragic Muse, 1784, oil on canvas (CONTINUED)
3. Gainsborough also “painted Mrs. Siddons in a conscious attempt to
outdo his great rival on the London scene, Sir Joshua Reynolds, who had
portrayed the same sitter as the Tragic Muse. Reynolds, a less adept
painter, had to rely on pose and expression to suggest the aura of
character that Gainsborough was able to convey through color and
brushwork alone. Reynolds, who had been president of the Royal
Academy since its founding in 1768, championed the academic approach
to art, which he had acquired during two years in Rome” (Janson 601).
“In his Discourses he set forth what he felt were necessary rules and
theories. His views were essentially those of Lebrun, tempered by British
common sense, and like Lebrun, he found if difficult to live up to his
theories in practice. Although he preferred history painting in the grand
style, most of his works are portraits „enabled‟ by allegorical additions or
disguises like those in his picture of Mrs. Siddons. His style owed a good
deal more to the Venetians, to the Flemish Baroque, and even to
Rembrandt (note the lighting in his Mrs. Siddons) than he was willing to
admit, although he often recommended following the example of earlier
masters” (601).
4. “Reynolds was generous enough to praise Gainsborough, whom he
outlived by a few years, and whose instinctive talent he must have envied.
He eulogized him as one who saw with the eye of a painter rather than a
poet, even if the compliment was left-handed. Gainsborough‟s painters
epitomized the Enlightenment philosopher David Hume‟s idea that
painting must incorporate both nature and art. Gainsborough himself
was a simple and unpretentious person who exemplified Hume‟s „natural
man‟, free of excessive pride and humility. Reynolds‟ approach, on the
other hand, as stated in his Discourses, was based on Horace‟s saying, ut
pictura poesis. His use of poses from the antique was intended to elevate
the sitter from an individual to a universal type through association with
the great art of the past and the noble ideals it embodied. This heroic
model was closely related to the writings of the playwright Samuel
Johnson and the practices of the actor David Garrick, both of whom were
friends of Reynolds. (Garrick sat for portraits by Hogarth and
Gainsborough, as well as Reynolds.) In this, Reynolds was the opposite of
Gainsborough. Yet, for all the differences between them, the two artists
had more in common, artistically and philosophically, than they cared to
admit” (601).
5. “Testimony of Reynolds‟ devotion to the Grand Tradition is that he went
deaf from spending too much time in the frosty rooms of the Vatican
while sketching the Raphaels that hung there. While on the continent, he
also caught a lifelong dose of „forum fever‟, thereafter littering his portraits
with Roman relics and noble poses. His dilemma was that, although he
could get rich at „face painting‟, only history painters were considered
poets among artists. Reynolds tried to combine the two genres, finding
fault with Gainsborough for painting „with the eye of the painter, not the
poet‟. Reynolds was a champion of idealizing reality. In separate
portraits both he and Gainsborough did of the actress Mrs. Siddons,
Gainsborough showed her as a fashionable lady, while Reynolds
portrayed here as a Tragic Muse enthroned between symbols of Pity and
Terror. He so idolized such masters as Raphael, Michelangelo, Rubens,
and Rembrandt he even painted his self-portrait costumed as the latter.
His portraits succeeded in spite of his pedantic self. „Damn him! How
various he is!‟ Gainsborough exclaimed of this artist who could paint
imposing military figures, genteel ladies, and playful children with equal
skill. Ironically, in his best portraits Reynolds ignored his own rules.
Instead of idealizing what he termed „deficiencies and deformities‟, he
relied on an intimate, direct style to capture the sitter‟s personality”
(Strickland 58). Gainsborough “painted landscapes for his own pleasure,
constructing miniature scenes in his studio of broccoli, sponges, and
moss to simulate unspoiled nature. These did not sell, so Gainsborough
had to content himself with inserting landscape backgrounds in his
portraits” (58).
31
V The Scottish Intellectuals: David Hume
and Adam Smith
1. “In the eighteenth century, all the thinkers who rooted
their work in empiricism owed something to the English
philosopher John Locke (1632-1704)… Locke‟s
originality lay in the modesty of his approach. For him,
human knowledge necessarily fell short of what exists in
reality but remains generally sufficient for human
purposes. Our ideas- he defined an idea as „whatever it is
the mind can be employed about in thinking‟- are not
born with us, but come from experience” (Lucie-Smith
323). “For Locke, property was the foundation of society,
and it was therefore one of the primary ends of
government to preserve property rights, as well as to
regulate the ways in which it could be used, distributed,
or transferred. It was for this reason, he said, that men
gave up certain individual rights and freedoms, though
sovereignty remained with them. The notion of a „social
contract,‟ posited as an alternative to a state of nature
where all human beings were at war with one another,
was to be hugely influential among Locke‟s eighteenthcentury
successors” (323).
2. “David Hume (1711-76), one of a remarkable band of
eighteenth-century Scottish intellectuals, pushed Locke‟s
ideas further in A Treatise of Human Nature (1739) and
Philosophical Essays Concerning the Human
Understanding (1748-53). He was far more consciously
skeptical than Locke, and hostile to revealed religion. For
Hume, all our ideas come either from sensory
impressions or from inner feelings. In addition, we can
never discover a matter of fact through reasoning along; it
can be discovered, or at least inferred, only from
experience. He divided the reasoning process into two
parts – „abstract‟ reasoning concerning quantity and
number, and „experimental‟ reasoning, which concerned
itself with matters of fact. As for moral decisions, these
were a matter of sentiment- they depended on what
people felt about them, not on some external imperative,
such as religion” (323).
3. “Adam Smith (1723-90) was a close friend of Hume,
and a member of the same Scottish intellectual circle.
His main impact was in the sphere of economic theory,
and his most influential publication was The Wealth of
Nations (1776). Until this appeared, there had still been
an inclination to believe that wealth consisted simply of a
stockpile of possessions, land or money. Smith‟s
definition of wealth operated on a national rather than
personal level; he argued that a country‟s wealth and
potential for economic growth depended on the amount of
consumable goods which were circulated in trade, and
which were continually replaced as they were used.
Since, he said, „every individual is continually exerting
himself to find the mast advantageous employment for
whatever capital he can command,‟ the general welfare is
best served by allowing each of these individuals to
pursue his or her own interest, since, though intending
only their won personal gain, the capitalists contribute to
the general welfare by continually increasing the stock of
consumable goods. Smith was thus the father of the
policy of economic laisser faire- the doctrine of placing
minimum restrictions on capitalist enterprise and trade-
which influenced governments well into the nineteenth
century” (323-3).

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
W Joseph Wright of Derby. An Experiment with an Air Pump, 1768, oil on canvas
Joseph Wright of Derby/ the bird in the glass bowl/ moonlight and the Enlightenment/ a questioning gesture
from the scientist/ a reflective pose of the philosopher/ two sisters torn between curiosity and distress/
appearance of well-dressed lovers
1. “One of the earliest practitioners of a Romantic mode in Britain was Joseph
Wright of Derby (1734-1797), who had trained as a portrait painter with Thomas
Hudson, Reynolds‟s teacher. After Wright‟s Grand Tour of 1773-1775, he returned
to the Midlands to paint its local society. Many of those he painted were the selfmade
entrepreneurs of the first wave of the Industrial Revolution, which was a
member of the Lunar Society, a group of industrialists (including Wedgewood),
mercantilists, and progressive nobles who met in Derby. As part of the society‟s
attempts to popularize science, Wright painted a series of „entertaining‟ scenes of
scientific experiments, including An Experiment on a Bird in the Air-Pump”
(Stokstad, Art History 949-50). “The air pump was one of the most innovative
scientific developments of the eighteenth century. Although it was employed
primarily to study the property of gases, it was also widely used to promote the
public‟s interest in science because of its dramatic possibilities. In the experiment
shown here, air was pumped out of the large glass bowl until the small creature
inside, a bird, collapsed from lack of oxygen; before the animal died, air was
reintroduced by a simple mechanism at the top of the bowl. In front of an
audience of adults and children, a lecturer is shown on the verge of reintroducing
air into the glass receiver. Near the window at right, a boy stands ready to lower a cage when the bird revives. (The moon visible out the
window is a reference to the Lunar Society.) By delaying the reintroduction of air, the scientist has created considerable suspense, as the
reactions of the two girls indicate. Their father, a voice of reason, attempts to dispel their fears. The dramatic lighting not only
underscores the life-and-death issue of the bird‟s fate but also suggests the fact that science brings light into a world of darkness and
ignorance. The lighting adds a religious dimension as well” (950).
2. “The moon is probably a reference to the Lunar Society. Based in the English Midlands, the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, it
met each month to discuss recent scientific developments and conduct experiments. Many of Wright‟s friends and patrons were members
of the Society. It epitomizes, like Wright‟s painting, the spirit and exchange of ideas that are the essence of the Enlightenment (the Age of
Reason). The Society met during the full moon so that its members would have the convenience of riding home by the light of the moon-
hence the Society‟s name” (Cumming, Annotated Art 69). “The visiting scientist has flowing locks and a long robe, which make him look
rather like a wizard. It was common practice at the time for a scientist to travel to a private residence to provide an evening‟s
entertainment and instruction to a wealthy family” (68).
3. “Born in Derby, near the site of England‟s first large manufactory, Joseph Wright became the first painter of the Industrial Revolution,
a portraitist and friend of manufacturers, engineers and those early scientists who were still called „natural philosophers‟. Trained in
London by Thomas Hudson, teacher of Wright‟s older contemporary Reynolds, he, like Reynolds, desired to be more than an „ordinary‟
craftsman. In the enquiring spirit of Derby acquaintances, and emulating the Dutch followers of Caravaggio- „candlelight‟ masters such
as Honthorst and Godfired Schalcken who had worked at the English court- Wright turned to ceaseless pictorial experiments in the effects
of light, notably in nocturnal views of industrial scenes- blacksmiths‟ shops, iron forges, glass-blowing houses, blast furnaces, cotton
mills- and of volcanic eruptions, which he depicted repeatedly after witnessing Vesuvius in action during a visit to Italy in 1773-5. All were
painted with a new, Romantic fervour, in which, like the scientist and poet Dr. Erasmus Darwin, grandfather of Charles, Wright was able
to „Inlist Imagination under the banner of Science‟” (Langmuir 329). “Darwin‟s tag fittingly describes this large painting, at once modern
genre, „history painting‟, vanitas and portrait. It depicts not so much an experiment as a science-based home entertainment of the kind
which Josiah Wedgewood was to arrange in 1779, when he summoned an assistant of the chemist Joseph Priestley to instruct his
children and his friends. In Wright‟s picture a charismatic natural philosopher demonstrates the effects of a vacuum and the necessity of
air for living creatures. The air has been pumped out of the flask at the top of the large apparatus on the table with the air pump,
invented by the German physicist Otto von Guericke in about 1650. Another of his inventions, a pair of Magdeburg spheres, is lying
nearby; when they are placed together, the air pumped out from between them, the resultant vacuum makes the spheres inseparable. In
the flask a valuable white cockatoo is struggling for air and appears near to death. Only the scientist- white-haired and direct of gaze and
gesture like God the Father in religious imagery- can save it by releasing the valve at the top of the flask” (329-330).
4. “The boy at the window lowers the bird‟s cage in hope of its imminent release; his two sisters react with grief and horror to their pet‟s
agony, as their father adduces the chilly comforts of reason. The elderly man on the right meditates on death- a theme whose universal
application is made even plainer by the human skull preserved in the large glass, from behind which shines a single candle. Another
traditional motif of transience is introduced in the watch in which the man on the left times the demonstration. Behind his a boy watches
with fascination. The youthful couple are alone in ignoring the central action, their eyes locked in love, their thoughts only of life. They
are Mary Barlow and Thomas Coltman, who were to marry in 1769; their double portrait as a married couple, painted by Wright in 1771,
is also in the [National] Gallery” in London (330). “A fainter secondary source of light is the moon outside the window- a Gothick touch
reminding us that in the late eighteenth century science and the occult were sometimes confused, and equally enthralling. In a few years,
Dr. Mesmer would demonstrate „animal magnetism‟ in Paris, while in England Erasmus Darwin‟s Lunar Society would meet every Monday
nearest the full moon to discuss advances in science and technology” (330).
32

UNIT NINE: Late Baroque and Rococo STUDY GUIDE
X Canaletto. The Grand Canal Looking Down to the Rialto Bridge, c. 1758-63, oil on canvas
Canaletto/ vedute painting/ effects of light and water/ probable use of a camera obscura/ acutely observed
human activities/ gondolas
1. “During the eighteenth century, landscape in Italy evolved a new form in keeping with the character of the Rococo: veduta (view)
painting. Its beginnings can be traced back to the seventeenth century with the many foreigners, such as Claude Lorraine, who
specialized in depicting Rome‟s environs. After 1720, however, it took on a specifically urban identity. The most famous of the vedutists
was Canaletto (Giovanni Antonio Canal, 1697-1768) of Venice. His pictures were great favorites with the British, who bought them as
souvenirs of the grand tours of Italy, then so popular. Indeed, he enjoyed such success with clients from England that he later became
one of several Venetian artists to spend long sojourns in London” (Janson 610-11).
2. “Canaletto‟s landscapes are, for the most part, topographically accurate. However, he
was not above tampering with the truth. While he usually made only slight adjustments
for the sake of the composition, he would sometimes treat scenes with considerable
freedom or create composite views. He may have used a mechanical or optical device
(perhaps a camera obscura, a forerunner of the photographic camera) to render some of
his views, although he was a skilled draftsman who hardly needed such aids. In any event,
they fail to account for the sparkle of his pictures and this sure sense of composition… He often
included vignettes of daily life in Venice that lend a human interest to his scenes and make them
fascinating cultural documents as well” (610).
3. “From the first Giovanni Antonio Canaletto (1697-1768) was a professional, one of a family of professionals. His approach to view
painting must certainly have been influenced by his early training in stage design, upon which he was collaborating with his father
Bernardo and his uncle (or elder brother) Cristoforo by the time he was nineteen. Although no actual designs have survived, we know the
names of certain plays for which Bernardo and his sons are recorded as having executed the scenery; and the type of scenery can be
gauged well enough. The chief exponents of theatrical décor at the time were the Bibiena family, whose complicated architectural
perspectives provided the setting for every type of play. One of their favorite devices was the scena all’angolo, whereby the stage setting
was constructed at an angle, which gave the spectator a more lively and interesting vista down the pillars and porticoes and balustrades
that represented the inevitable location of most plays: a palace interior” (Levy 104).
4. “No better painter of townscapes has ever existed, and even when his style grew tamer, neater and – it must be admitted- more
mechanical, he did not lose his passion for the facts of Venice: from a flowerpot on a barred window-sill to a well-head, including the
stance of a gondolier, and the set of a mask and cape, as well as the sequin-like flicker of light dotting a steep, tiled roof or a statue
gesticulating whitely against a crisp blue sky. And his instincts made him also- as tends to be understressed- a keen observer of Venetian
people of all classes. He is indeed the work of someone who was „origine civis venetus’, and could never forget that origin. Yet although
detail proliferates in his pictures, he knew how to subordinate it to overall grasp of the scene. At their best, his pictures are built out of
glowing light and strong shade, which in turn model the buildings depicted, creating an uncanny illusion of looking into not just the view
shown but somehow beyond: into the city, which is felt extending far outside the composition, around the corner of the canal or the angle
of a church, behind the last façade and the jumble of chimneypots and campanili on the horizon. Not only bricks and mortar but life itself
is grasped- and felt to be going on with a serene assurance” (107, 112).
5. “Canaletto certainly drew on the spot, but the sureness of his eye was matched by a sureness of mind. He believed implicitly in the
truth of his visual sensations, untroubled obviously by doubts or waverings. The actual visible world was reality for him… Hence the
conviction of Canaletto‟s art, which lifts it above any mere reproduction of picturesque sites. What sometimes seems his prosaicism, is, in
fact, his strength. That his views are seldom accurate topographically has been absorbingly and exhaustively demonstrated, and yet the
demonstration seems oddly beside the point. It emphasizes only what can be sensed in most of Canaletto‟s pictures, that he was complete
master of his material subject matter- constantly rearranging it and ingeniously modifying it for his own pictorial ends. But the resulting
paintings were intended to look overwhelmingly factual and „true‟. They do, and that they do so is the ultimate indication of their creator‟s
confidence in his own artistry” (112).
6. “The years of his first fame are probably the time when he began to assemble some pupils and co-workers in his studio; for vast as was
his own output, he can hardly be responsible for all the Canalettesque views we have, even after imitations and frank pastiches have been
discarded. No doubt the studio helpers were useful in preparing pictures even when they did not really paint them, and examination of
Canalettos of the late thirties and early forties seems to indicate attempts at mass production. Many of the scenes would already be
recorded by an original sketch made on the spot by Canaletto and often worked up more elaborately in further drawing done by him in the
studio. From this second drawing the paintings could be prepared. The practice seems to have been to paint in the sky, and even
sometimes the clouds, across the whole upper area of the picture; presumably the buildings were then drawn in over this and certainly
their outlines were incised into the sky paint so as to provide guidance for the actual painting of them. Traces of inclusion are visible
along roofs and cornices, semi-circular lines marking arches and domes, and though these are also present in paintings entirely by
Canaletto, equally they are preparations that assistants could easily and usefully make for the final brush of the master. In fact, many
Canaletto‟s show fluctuations in quality within the one picture: now the figures are more clumsy than his, now authentic Canaletto
figures enliven a dully-painted architectural scene” (112-113). “Canaletto produced a few capricci, views of Venice where famous
landmarks are piquantly jumbled together… These were paintings to be appreciated more by the resident or native than by the tourist”
(113). “It was not until 1763, however, that prejudice against his type of art softened enough for him to be admitted to the Venetian
Academy. And at Rome during the eighteenth century, the Director of the French Academy refused rooms to landscape painters,
reserving them for students of … history painting” (117).
33

UNIT NINE: Neoclassicism STUDY GUIDE
A Richard Boyle (Earl of Burlington) and William Kent. Chiswick House (near London, England), begun
1725
clear alternative to the splendors of Versailles/ Palladian classicism to create a “rational” look
1. “In England, the Baroque- and especially Rococo, with all its frills – was rejected in the
eighteenth century in favor of renewed interest in the ordered, classicizing appearance of
Palladian architecture. Palladio‟s Four Books of Architecture was published in an English
translation in 1715, and exerted widespread influence. An early example of English
Palladian style is Chiswick House on the southwestern outskirts of London, which Lord
Burlington (1695-1753) began in 1725 as a library and place for entertainments” (Adams,
Art Across Time 691). “Lord Burlington was one of a powerful coterie of Whigs and
supporters of the House of Hanover (George I and his family). He took a Grand Tour of
Europe in 1714 to 1715 and returned to Italy in 1719 to revisit Palladio‟s buildings. On
his return to England, he became an accomplished architect in the tradition of Palladio”
(691). “Burlington based Chiswick House loosely on Palladio‟s Villa Rotonda, although it is on a
smaller scale, and there are some significant differences in the plans. Unlike the Villa Rotonda,
Chiswick House did not need four porticos. Instead, it has one, which is approached by lateral
double staircases on each side. The arrangement of the rooms around a central octagon rather than
a circle is also different, and the columns are Corinthian rather than Ionic as in the Villa Rotonda.
There are no gable sculptures, and the roof is decorated on each side by a row of obelisks, which
function as chimney flues. The dome is shallower than that of the Villa Rotonda, and rests on an
octagonal drum, allowing more light into the central chamber” (692).
2. “The building plan shares the geometrical symmetry of Palladio‟s villa, although its central core is octagonal rather than round and
there are only two entrances. The main entrance, flanked now by matching staircases, is a Roman temple front, a flattering reference to
the building‟s inhabitant. Chiswick‟s elevation is characteristically Palladian, with a main floor resting on a basement, and tall
rectangular windows with triangular pediments. The result is a lucid evocation of Palladio‟s design, whose few but crisp details seem
perfectly suited to the refined proportions of the whole. The popularity of the Palladian style among members of Burlington‟s class during
the ensuing decades may be judged by the fact that Hogarth satirized the style in his Marriage a la Mode suite. The architect looking out
the window in The Marriage Contract is probably a caricature of Burlington himself. In Rome, Burlington had persuaded an English
expatriate, William Kent (1685-1748), to return to London as his collaborator. Kent designed Chiswick‟s surprisingly ornate interior as
well as the grounds, the latter in a style that became known throughout Europe as the „English landscape garden.‟ Kent‟s garden, in
contrast to the regularity and rigid formality of Baroque gardens, featured winding paths, a lake with a cascade, irregular plantings and
shrubs, and other effects imitating the appearance of the natural rural landscape. The English landscape garden was another indication
of the growing Enlightenment emphasis on the natural” (Stokstad, Art History 943).
3. “Palladio appealed to the English partly because his designs for villas were well-suited to English country houses and partly because
his style accorded with the Rule of Taste promoted by the Enlightenment philosopher Anthony Ashley Cooper, Third Earl of Shaftesbury.
What distinguishes the Palladian revival from earlier classicisms, however, is less its external appearance than its motivation Instead of
merely reasserting the superior authority of the ancients, it claimed to satisfy the demands of reason and thus to be more „natural‟ than
the Baroque. At the time the Baroque style was identified with papist Rome by English Protestants, with absolutist France by George I,
and with Tory policies by the Whig opposition. Thus began an association with between Neoclassicism and liberal politics that was to
continue through the French Revolution. The appeal to reason found support in Palladio himself, who decried abuses „contrary to natural
reason‟ on the grounds that „architecture, as well as all other arts, being an imitation of nature, can suffer nothing that either alienates or
deviates from that which is agreeable to nature‟. This rationalism helps to explain the abstract, segmented look of Chiswick House on
Burlington‟s estate. Adapted by Burlington and Kent from the Villa Rotonda, as well as other Italian sources, it is compact, simple, and
geometric- the antithesis of the Baroque pomp of Blenheim Palace. The concept was not new to England. It had been used on a larger
scale just a couple of years earlier at Mereworth castle by Campbell. Chiswick is at once bolder and more rigorous, yet less derivative
than Mereworth. Campbell himself acknowledged Burlington as „not only a great Patron of all Arts, but the first Architect‟. The exterior
surfaces are flat and unbroken, the ornament is meager, and the temple portico juts out abruptly from the blocklike body of the structure.
The interior, probably by Kent, is more luxurious, in the manner of Jones, but with a clarity that looks forward to Robert Adam” (Janson
650, 652).
4. “In eighteenth-century Britain the majority of works of art and architecture, whether houses or gardens, paintings or sculptures, were
created for a wealthy, predominantly English and aristocratic minority of the population. But those works express certain attitudes-
above all the notion that sense of one‟s own grandeur or self-importance is something to be cautiously and carefully expressed- which
were shared by the nation as a whole. Those same attitudes are present, albeit in a very different form, in the art that stood at the
opposite end of the spectrum from the art of the aristocracy. The eighteenth century saw the beginnings of the British love and genius for
satire: the ironizing and diminishing of the noble, the wealthy, the famous, which has remained a stock-in-trade of popular art and
journalism for more than two centuries” (Graham-Dixon 94). “Following William Kent‟s lead, landscape architecture flourished in the
hands of such designers as Lancelot (‘Capability’) Brown and Henry Flitcroft. In 1743, the banker Henry Hoare redid the grounds of
his estate at Stourhead in Wiltshire with the assistance of Flitcroft, a protégé of Burlington. The resulting gardens at Stourhead carried
William Kent‟s ideas much further. Stourhead is, in effect, an exposition of the picturesque, with orchestrated views dotted with Greek
and Roman temples, grottoes, copies of antique statues, and such added delights as a rural cottage, a Chinese bridge, a Gothic spire, and
a Turkish tent” (Stokstad, Art History 943).
34

UNIT NINE: Neoclassicism STUDY GUIDE
B Robert Adam. Etruscan Room at Osterley
Park House (Middlesex, England), begun 1761
Robert Adam/ new discoveries at Pompeii/ return
of symmetry and rectilinear quality combined with
delicacy/ decorative motifs taken from antiquity
1. “Another leader of the Classical
revival in England, particularly in the
field of interior design, was Robert
Adam (1728-92). Interest in
Classical antiquity had been
heightened by the excavations at
Herculaneum and Pompeii.
Discoveries from these sites provided
the first concrete examples of
imperial Roman domestic
architecture since the eruption of Mt.
Vesuvius in A.D. 79. Publications
about Classical archaeology followed”
(Adams, Art Across Time 692).
2. “Not only was Adam influenced by these, but he was himself
an enthusiastic amateur archaeologist. He had traveled to Rome
and made drawings of the ruins, which informed much of his
own work” (692). “His friendship with Piranesi in Rome
reinforced Adam‟s goal of arriving at a personal style based on
the antique without slavishly imitating it. He was also
influenced by Clerisseau, with whom he measured the palace of
Diocletian at Split. His genius is seen most fully in the interiors
he designed in the 1760s for palatial homes, which take the style
of Lord Burlington and William Kent as their point of departure.
Most are remodelings of or additions to existing homes. Because
he commanded an extraordinarily wide vocabulary, including
the Gothic, each room is different in both shape and design. Yet
the syntax, which treats classicism with remarkable richness
and flexibility, remains distinctive to him” (Janson 657).
3. “Adam was concerned above all with movement, but this idea
must be understood not in terms of Baroque dynamism or
Rococo ornamentation but in the careful balance of varied
shapes and proportions. The play of semicircles, half domes,
and arches lends an air of festive grace… This intention was in
keeping with Adam‟s personality, which was at ease with the
aristocratic circles in which he moved” (657). The effect of his
rooms, “stately yet intimate, echoes the delicacy of Rococo
interiors (Adam had stayed in Paris in 1754 before going to
Rome) but with a characteristically Neoclassic insistence on
planar surfaces, symmetry, and geometric precision” (657).
D The Concept of the Picturesque
35
C Johann Joachim Winckelmann
1. “The eighteenth century, particularly the later half, saw
the beginning of modern art theory and art history. The
very term “esthetic” is an eighteenth-century invention”
(Adams, Art Across Time 677).
2. “Johann Joachim Winckelmann(1719-68) was born in
Berlin, and became a librarian near Dresden. There he met
artists and visited museums. In the 1760s he moved to
Rome, where he was appointed Superintendent of
Antiquities, and oversaw excavations at Herculaneum and
Pompeii. Based on his publication in 1764 of The History
of Ancient Art, Winckelmann has been called the father of
art history, because he believed that styles of art were
determined by their cultures. He thus expanded the study
of art beyond the more biographical approach of Vasari and
the Classical tradition, and beyond the philosophical views
of Plato and Aristotle. Beauty, for Winckelmann, was a matter
of intuition and spirit, and the height of esthetic beauty had been
attained by Greece in the fifth and fourth centuries BC Roman art,
he said, was derivative of Greek art, which was noble, restrained,
and ideal. The Renaissance, in his view, was a revival not of
Roman, but of Greek art. Winckelmann classified ancient art into
four phases: Archaic, Phidian, the fourth century BC and the
period from the third century BC through the fall of the Roman
Empire. These categories became a model for later art historical
divisions” (677).
3. The ideas of Winckelmann “deeply impressed two painters then
living in Rome, the German Anton Raphael Mengs (1728-1779)
and the Scotsman Gavin Hamilton (1723-1798). Both had strong
antiquarian leanings but otherwise limited artistic ability. This
shortcoming may explain why they accepted Winckelmann‟s
doctrine so readily. Mengs‟ importance lies principally in his role
as a proselytizer of the „Winckelmann program‟, since most of his
paintings are weak paraphrases of Italian art. He left Rome in
1761 after painting his major work, a ceiling fresco of Parnassus
inspired by Raphael, and went to Spain, where he vied with the
aging Tiepolo. It is a measure of Italy‟s decline that artistic
leadership passed to the Northerners who gathered in Rome. The
only roman painter who could compete on even terms with the
foreigners was Pompeo Batoni (1708-1787), a splendid technician
who continued the eclectic classicism of Carlo Maratta but is
remembered today chiefly for portraits of his English patrons. This
vacuum helps to account for the astonishing success of Mengs and
Hamilton” (Janson 540).
1. “The most successful of the Roman vedute painters was Giovanni Paolo Panini (c. 1692-1765). Like Canaletto, he specialized in
documentary vistas” (Stokstad, Art History 939). “Piranesi is best known for his views of ancient Roman ruins… Such works are fine
examples of the new taste for the picturesque, which contemporary British theorists defined as a landscape (actual or depicted) with an
aesthetically pleasing irregularity in its shapes, composition, and lighting” (939). “Piranesi‟s and his patrons‟ interest in Roman ruins and
in their tragic implications was fueled by the discoveries made at Herculaneum and Pompeii shortly before mid-century” (939).
2. The British garden at Stowe “revolves around a series of picturesque views. Nature and architecture have been composed to recall,
from certain ideal vantage points, Poussin‟s or Claude‟s idealized paintings of the Roman campagna. A corner of England has been
remodeled to resemble ancient Rome, not only for purely aesthetic reasons but also in order to make a point. The classicism of the
buildings dotted throughout the garden delivers the same implicit message, announcing that Britain has become a new Rome and a new
Greece… Walking though the garden, it is clear that the set-piece vistas are only temporary visual harmonies, transient moments of order
and classical perfection, that dissolve into and are reclaimed by the shapelessness of an English landscape” (Graham-Dixon 89). Stowe
“was designed in great part by Capability Brown, one of the earliest pioneers of a distinctively British form of landscape garden” (88).