18th Century Styles

The Art of the Enlightenment

Context• The Enlightenment – A period of great advances in the pure and natural sciences, accompanied by a decline in the Church.• Beginning of democratic movements (such as in the new United States)• Decline of Monarchies – French Revolution in 1789, decline of absolute monarchies in other countries.• Industrial Revolution – scientific investigation leads to technological inventions, such as electricity, combustion, coal, steam engines, understanding of oxygen, invention of new building materials, improved iron quality, and photography. Steam engine replaces human labor, leading to manufacturing based economy in England, then the rest of Europe. • Industrial Revolution lead to growth of cities and urban working class, expansion of colonialism to supply cheap labor and raw materials.• Idea of Manifest Destiny – ideological justification for continued territorial expansion. • Emergence of Britain as a dominant maritime power• Archeological discoveries of Herculaneum (1709) and Pompeii (1748) lead to interest in history, Neoclassicism.• Great Age of Music – Handel, Bach, Haydn, Pachelbel, Vivaldi

Illustration of Industrial Manufacturing

Great Thinkers• Newton - Isaac Newton insisted on empirical proof of his theories, and avoided metaphysics and the supernatural. This emphasis on tangible, concrete data became the standard for Enlightenment thinkers. Later thinkers applied Newton’s rationality to structuring a rationally organized society. • Locke – John Locke’s Doctrine of Empiricism dictated that “knowledge comes through sensory perception of the material world,” from which people form ideas. People are born good. Laws of nature grant them the natural rights of life, liberty, property, and freedom of conscience. Government is to protect these rights, and people have right of revolution when the government is corrupt.• Diderot – Took on task of gathering and disseminating knowledge. Became editor of the Encyclopédie (consisting of 35 volumes of text and illustrations published between 1751 and 1780), a compilation of articles written by more than a hundred contributors, including leading philosophers, scientists, and artists.

Great Thinkers• Voltaire -Introduced ideas of Newton and Locke to French society-Hated the arbitrary despotic rule of kings, the selfish privileges of the nobility and the church, religious intolerance, and the injustice of the French “old order.” -Wrote numerous books and pamphlets, which were frequently condemned and burned by authorities.-Believed humankind could never be happy until an enlightened society removed the traditional obstructions to the progress of the human mind. -Did not believe that all men were created equal.• Rousseau -Believed the salvation of humanity lay in the advancement of science and the rational improvement of society.-Argued the arts, sciences, society, and civilization in general had corrupted “natural man” – people in their primitive state. -Believed emotion came before reason, and was the more “natural” state.-Believed natural inclinations were correct, that man was naturally good, but was perverted by society.-Exalted the ideal of the peasant’s simple life, with its honest and unsullied emotions.

Chardin Saying GraceJean-Baptiste-Simeon Chardin

1740. Oil on canvas. 1’ 7” x 1’ 3”. • The writings of Rousseau were largely responsible for the turning away from the Rococo sensibility in the arts and the formation of a taste for the “natural,” as opposed to the artificial and frivolous – Naturalism.• Chardin painted quiet scenes of domestic life, praising the simple goodness of ordinary people, especially mothers and young children. • In this scene a young mother in a humble home lays out dinner for her two daughters. In a moment of social instruction, the mother and older daughter supervise the younger daughter in the simple, pious ritual of giving thanks to God before a meal.• The simple composition and subdued colors, with the figures highlighted against a dark background, communicate the gentle seriousness and calm of the moment. • The objects in the painting, realistically rendered, appear well-worn and humble.• The emotion is sincere and sympathetic, not contrived and artificial.

Greuze

Village BrideJean-Baptiste Greuze. 1761.

Oil on canvas. 3’ x 3’10”.

• Greuze was another naturalist painter who focused on the simplicity and virtue of rural life.• A growing bourgeois middle class created an expanding market for artworks such as this one.• In this image, a father passes his daughter’s dowry to his new son-in-law, and blesses their marriage. A notary on the right records the event.• While the couple gently clasp hands, the mother gives her daughter’s hand a final caress, and a sister weeps behind the bride’s shoulder. A jealous older sister broods behind the father. • Rosy-faced children and country birds move about in the foreground, adding to the country setting.• The story is one of a happy climax to a rural romance, communicating the moral that happiness is the reward of “natural” virtue.

• Vigee-Lebrun was a well-respected portrait artist in the mid- to late-1700s. One of her most famous patrons was the French Queen Marie Antoinette.• In Vigee-Lebrun’s self-portrait, she depicted herself looking directly at the viewer, in a self-confident yet lighthearted stance.• Vigee-Lebrun’s art won her independence and prominence, and she was even one of the few female artists to be admitted into the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture (although her membership was revoked after the French Revolution, when women were no longer welcome into the Academy).• In the portrait of Marie Antoinette and her Children (painted five years before Marie’s execution in 1792), Vigee-Lebrun attempted to counter public opinion of the Queen as selfish, extravagant, and immoral by depicting her as a kindly, stabilizing mother. • Although the Queen holds a regal pose, her children are depicted more sympathetically, with her daughter leaning against her arm, and her son pointing to the empty cradle of a recently deceased sibling.• Vigee-Lebrun fled Paris in 1789 with her daughter, and after working successfully in Rome, England, Russia, and Austria, later returned again to Paris in 1805.

Vigee-LebrunMarie Antoinette and her ChildrenElisabeth-Louise Vigée-Lebrun1787. Oil on canvas. 9’ x 7’.

Self-PortraitVigée-Lebrun. 1790.

8’4” x 6’9”.

• Labille-Guiard was one of the other few women to be accepted into the Royal Academy of Art. Although she did receive royal patronage, it was only of Louis XVI’s aunts, not the queen herself.• However, during the French Revolution, Labille-Guiard took the opposite side as Vigee-Lebrun, and Labille-Guiard painted portraits of some of the uprisings leaders, most notably one of the few known portraits of Maximilien Robespierre, the most prominent figure calling for the death of Louis XVI. • There are a few notable differences between Labille-Guiard’s and Vigee-Lebrun’s self-portraits. -Vigee-Lebrun painted herself working on a portrait of Marie Antoinette (her most important patron), whereas Labille-Guiard’s subject is unknown to the viewer. -Labille-Guiard’s portrait focuses on herself in the role of teacher. She had as many as 9 apprentices at one time.-In this image, two apprentices (clad more simply) look on.-The figures form a classical pyramidal composition, echoed by the easel. -In the background is a portrait bust of her father, reversing the gender roles of artist and muse.

Labille-GuiardSelf-Portrait with Two PupilsAdélaïde Labille-Guiard

1785. Oil on canvas. 7’ x 5’.

MaximilienRobespierre

• The English painter William Hogarth sought to translate the satire found in English writing at the time to visual art by painting a series of images, in chronological order, following the same characters through an experience with a moral ill. • Communicates a moral message (usually about the excesses of the wealthy, privileged elite) through the use of satire.• In Marriage a la Mode, Hogarth chronicled the marriage of a young couple (for money), from the arrangement of the marriage, through romantic dalliances, disease, and eventually death. • In the second of six paintings (Breakfast Scene), identify clues that hint at the couple’s doomed fate.• As a novelist might, Hogarth elaborated on his subject with carefully chosen detail, the discovery of which heightened the comedy. • These paintings were originally intended to be made into engravings, the prints of which could be sold cheaply to many, thereby spreading his moral message.

Hogarth

Breakfast Scene from Marriage á la ModeWilliam Hogarthc. 1745. Oil on canvas.2’4” x 3’.

Gainsborough

Mrs. Richard Brinsley SheridanThomas Gainsborough. 1787. Oil on canvas.7’2” x 5’.

• Another English painter, Thomas Gainsborough, combined naturalistic portraits with landscapes (his favorite type of painting). • In the painting of Mrs. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Gainsborough presented Mrs. Sheridan as a lovely, informally dressed woman in a rustic landscape reminiscent of Watteau. • Gainsborough matched the natural, unspoiled beauty of the landscape with Mrs. Sheridan, whom he painted with dark brown hair blowing in the wind and expression of sweetness. • Originally, Gainsborough planned to add sheep in the background to make the painting more pastoral, but died before he could finish the painting. • The image of Robert Andrews and Frances Carter (bottom) also depicts people in an idealized, pastoral landscape. The farmer, Robert, and his new wife, pose naturally, proudly surveying their farm, which shows evidence of careful tending. • The pheasant in Frances’ lap is also unfinished.

The Blue Boy

Reynolds

Lord HeathfieldSir Joshua Reynolds

1787. Oil on canvas. 4’ 8” x 3’ 9”

• Morality of a more heroic tone than found in the work of Greuze, yet in harmony with “naturalness,” included the virtues of honor, valor, and love of country. “Nobility” (according to Rousseau) referred to character, not to aristocratic birth. • As the revolutionary mood became stronger, ideas of courage, patriotism, and self-sacrifice became important, and the modern military hero was of humble origins, not aristocratic birth.• Lord Heathfield was an English commander who defended the English fortress at Gibraltar against the Spanish and French (symbolized by his holding a key of the fortress in front of a smoky battle scene background). • Lord Heathfield is an example of Grand Manner portraiture, in which the subject was depicted naturalistically, but the person’s grace and class was communicated through conventions such as pose, landscape, and view angle. • Reynolds also advocated for the study of classical artists, and sought to communicate Grand Manner through classical association. • What allusions to Classical Greece are visible in the depiction of Lady Sarah Bunbury?

Lady Sarah Bunbury Sacrificing to the GracesSir Joshua Reynolds1765. Oil on canvas. 7’ 10 x 5’.

Copley Paul RevereJohn Singleton Copleyc. 1770.Oil on canvas. 2’ 11” x 2’ 4”.

• An American by birth, Copley later moved permanently to England. He specialized in portraits and historical events. • Before his move, he painted a portrait of Paul Revere. This portrait shows Revere at work in his silversmith shop, working on a silver teapot. He pauses for a moment, and glances at us. • The informality and the sense of the moment link this painting to the contemporaneous European Naturalistic portraits, however, the spare style and the emphasis on Revere’s down-to-earth character, dressed only in his simple shirtsleeves, make this work distinctly American. • After his move to London, Copley focused on depictions of historical events, such as in Watson and the Shark. Watson, a Tory politician, commissioned Copley to paint a depiction of the time Watson was attacked by a shark as a teenager. • An African man standing at the apex of the scene has unclear connotations. He may signify one of the following:-British exasperation with American insistence on independence when they themselves kept slaves-He may be a slave, holding the rope to hand to his master-He may signify that the event is taking place in Havana.

Watson and the SharkJohn Singleton Copley

1778. Oil on canvas.5’11” x 7’6”.

• Like Copley, Benjamin West was an American painter who moved to Europe, where he made a name for himself creating paintings depicting historical events. • He co-founded the Royal Academy of Arts, and succeeded Reynolds as its president. • He became official painter to King George III, even through the tense times of the American Revolution. • In this painting, West depicted the mortally wounded young English commander just after his defeat of the French in the decisive battle of Quebec in 1759, which gave Canada to Great Britain. • The uniforms, while not completely accurate in detail, were typical of contemporary clothing. • West created a sense of traditional history painting by arranging the figures in a theatrical, saint-like composition, reminiscent of images of the lamentation over Christ. • West wanted to depict the hero’s death in the service of the state as a martyrdom charged with religious emotions. • His combination of the conventions of traditional heroic painting with a look of modern realism influenced history painting well into the 19th century.

Benjamin West

Death of General WolfeBenjamin West

1770. Oil on canvas. 5’ x 7’.

• Another artist who focused on images of “events,” although not historical ones, was Joseph Wright of Derby, England. • Wright was fascinated with science and experimentation, and depicted scientists at work in dramatic but generic scenes. • In A Philosopher Giving a Lecture at the Orrery, the scientist, in red, demonstrates an orrery (a model of the orbits of the planets, which rotates around a lamp representing the sun, at the correct velocity for each orbit) to a crowd of rapt onlookers. • The drama of the scene is heightened by the lighting.• Wright arranged the subjects in a circular fashion, echoing the roundness of the orrery. • What appears to be happening in An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump? How are the observers reacting?• Although there are less women than men in the audience, and in both cases the scientists are male, it is notable that women are being included in the audience.• Wright’s choices of subjects and realism appealed to the great industrialists of the day.

WrightA Philosopher Giving a Lecture at the Orrery.Joseph Wright of Derby.c. 1765. Oil on canvas, 4’10” x 6’8”

An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump. Joseph Wright of Derby.c. 1768. 6 x 8’

Piranesi View of the Pantheon, Rome.Giovanni Battista Piranesi.

From the Views of Rome series, first printed in 1756. Etching. 189 x

27”.

• The discoveries of the ancient Roman cities buried by the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius (Herculaneum and Pompeii) lead to a sudden interest in the history of Rome. • European tourists were eager to purchase artifacts recovered from Herculaneum and Pompeii, and the rocaille of the Rococo style faded quickly out of favor, replaced by replicas of the Third and Fourth Styles of fresco painting. This style was called Pompeian style, and it replaced Rococo decor by about 1750.• It became fashionable for well-educated elites of France and England to take a “Grand Tour” of Europe as part of their education, during which they would visit various historical cities.• Eager to bring home souvenirs of their travels, English tourists purchased scenic images of the cities they visited, known as vedute (scenic views, veduta singular). • Piranesi was an Italian artist who created a series of etchings of various Roman buildings, the prints of which were sold to enthusiastic tourists. Etruscan Room,

Osterley Park House.

Robert Adam. 1761.

• Another artist who specialized in veduta painting was Canaletto, who focused primarily on paintings of Venice. • Wealthy Europeans (primarily the British) and Americans embarked on Grand Tours not as vacations, but as educational opportunities. The emphasis on classical knowledge during the Enlightenment made a Grand Tour a must-do for anyone looking to make a mark on society. • Typically, travellers followed a pre-determined itinerary, which focused on Rome as the primary city to visit in Italy, but could also include other major cities such as Venice. • In addition to Italy, travellers would also visit other major sites in Europe. Grand Tours typically took several years to complete.• Canaletto’s vendute, depicting sunny, picturesque views of Venice (note the Doge’s Palace) would have been pleasing to look at on a cold day back in England.• Canaletto made drawings using a camera obscura on site, then returned to his studio to refine his drawings. He used Renaissance perspective conventions and was selective about which details to include or not to create an ideal image.

CanalettoRiva degli Schiavoni, VeniceAntonio Canaletto, c. 1740.

Oil on canvas. 1‘6” x 2’1”

Kauffmann

Cornelia Presenting her Children as her TreasuresAngelica Kauffmann.

c. 1785. Oil on canvas. 40” x 50”

• The renewed interest in ancient Greece and Rome also manifested in a resurgence of classical painting subjects and style, known as Neoclassicism (“new classicism”).• The Enlightenment’s emphasis on rationality explains this classical focus, because the geometric harmony of classical art and architecture embodied Enlightenment ideals. • In addition, classical cultures represented the pinnacle of civilized society. Greece and Rome served as models of enlightened political organization, with their traditions of liberty, civic virtue, morality, and sacrifice. • Johann Joachim Winckelmann, considered the first art historian, wrote the History of Ancient Art (1764), in which he described ancient works of Greco-Roman art and positioned each one within a huge inventory by subject matter, style, and period (rather than focusing on artist biographies). In this way, he applied the scientific method of categorization to art history.• Angelica Kauffmann was a Swiss artist who worked in England, and was a founding member of the British Royal Academy of Arts. • In this image, Cornelia (mother of 2nd Century Roman leaders Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus) shows off her two sons as her “jewels” to a woman who is showing off her own jewelry.• Moralizing image, but set in ancient Roman setting.

• Initially influenced by his distant cousin Boucher, Jacques-Louis David traveled to Rome and became enamored with the “perfect form” of classical Greco-Roman sculptures, and rejected Rococo as artificial.• This scene depicts a story from pre-Republican Rome, in which the leaders of the warring cities of Rome and Alba decided to resolve their conflicts in a series of encounters waged by three representatives from each side. The Romans chose the three Horatius brothers, and the Albans chose the three Curatius brothers. The Horatius brothers prepare to fight for Rome.• The women on the right weep, because one Horatius sister is engaged to a Curatius brother, and the wife of one of the Horatius brothers is a sister to the Curatii. This creates a contrast between the masculine virtues of heroism and civic valor with emotion, love, and sorrow.• David used Roman art as his model, arranging his figures in a shallow, relief- or stage-like space.• This painting was commissioned by Louis XVI to arouse civic pride, but it ironically incited revolutionary fervor.

David

Oath of the HoratiiJacques-Louis David1784. Oil on canvas.

10’10” x 13’11”

• When the Revolution began, David sided with the Jacobins, a politically radical faction, who employed him as their main creator of propaganda. He used his art to inspire civic duty.• He ultimately decided to abandon images of classical events in favor of depicting current ones to create revolutionary zeal. • This image depicts Jean-Paul Marat, a Jacobin writer who was murdered in his bathtub (he suffered a skin condition which required frequent medicinal baths) by a woman named Charlotte Corday, a member of a rival political faction. • The dark, empty space creates a sense of eerie oppression. • The items indicating the narrative are all included in the foreground, such as the knife, and the letter with which Corday gained entrance, to enhance the outrage of the viewer.

DavidDeath of MaratJacques-Louis David. 1793. Oil on canvas.5’5” x 4’2”.

• The composition is based on Christ in Michelangelo’s Pieta, making an allusion to Marat as a saint-like martyr for the new civic “religion” of the revolution.

• The first use of iron in bridge design was the cast iron bridge built over the Severn River, near Coalbrookdale in England, where Abraham Darby III, one of the bridge’s two designers, ran his family’s cast iron business. • The Darby family had spearheaded the evolution of the iron industry in England, and they vigorously supported the investigation of new uses for the material, now that the material could be made more cheaply and with greater strength. • Darby worked with an architect (Pritchard) to use cast iron pieces to design a bridge. • The cast-iron armature supporting the roadbed springs from stone pier to stone pier until it leaps the final 100 feet across the river. The series of arches is reminiscent of Roman aqueducts. • Cast iron is made when liquid iron is poured into a mold. Wrought iron is made when the metal is heated enough to be flexible (but not liquid), then pounded into shape.

Coalbrookdale Bridge

Coalbrookdale Bridge (or Severn River Bridge)Abraham Darby III & Thomas F. Pritchard

Iron bridge, Coalbrookdale, England, 1776-1779.

Wrought iron

Cast iron

Soufflot’s Panthéon

Panthéon (Sainte-Geneviéve Church)Jacques-Germain SoufflotParis, France1755-1792.

• As painting turned away from the ornate ostentation of Baroque and Rococo styles, it returned to the clean, streamlined look of Classical architecture, echoing the Enlightenment emphasis on logic, order, and reason. • The Parisian church of Sainte-Genevieve, now the Panthéon, was based on the Roman ruins at Baalbek in Lebanon, especially the titanic Corinthian colonnade of the temple of Jupiter.• The walls are mostly blank, except for the garland at the top. • Floorplan is a Greek cross (equal length arms). • The drum of the dome is surrounded by a colonnade, a Neoclassical version of the dome of St. Peter’s. • The interior is supported by a grid of Corinthian columns.• Although the style is clearly Roman, the structural principles and modular plan is Gothic.

• Classical architecture was appealing in parliamentary England because of its association with morality, rationality, integrity, Athenian democracy, and Roman imperial rule. It rejected Baroque opulence, associated with absolute monarchies.• Vitruvius influenced Palladio who influenced Inigo Jones who influenced Kent & Boyle.• In 1715, Colin Campbell published Vitruvius Britannicus, which contained engravings of ancient buildings and text which denounced Baroque style while praising Jones and Palladio.• This also helped to popularize classical architecture, which Kent and Boyle drew from for Chiswick house, a new version of Palladio’s Villa Rotonda. • In its simple symmetry, unadorned planes, right angles, and precise proportions, Chiswick looks classical and rational. • However, this stern classical rationality is softened by the irregularity of the surrounding informal English garden, and the Rococo interior.

Chiswick House

Chiswick HouseRichard Boyle and William Kent

Near London, England. Begun 1725.Banqueting HouseInigo Jones.

Villa RotondaPalladio.

Jefferson

MonticelloThomas JeffersonCharlottesville, Virginia. 1770-1806.

• The statesman Thomas Jefferson, who was also an amateur architect, attempted to make Neoclassical style the “official” architectural style of the Unites States because it communicated morality, idealism, patriotism, civic virtue, and a connection to Athenian democracy. • Jefferson admired Palladio, and had studied Palladio’s Four Books of Architecture closely. • After returning from France (where he had studied the Maison Carree, an ancient Roman temple at Nimes), he began to redesign his home, Monticello.• His new design was clearly influenced by Palladio’s Villa Rotonda, however it differed in that he used local materials (timber and brick). • As president, he appointed Benjamin Latrobe to build the US Capitol in Washington, DC in Roman style.

Rotunda and Lawn, University of Virginia, Charlottesville

Thomas Jefferson, c. 1820.

• Jefferson designed the University of Virginia (which he founded) with a rotunda (reminiscent of the Pantheon) at the end of a large rectangular lawn. The lawn is lined on both sides with a total of ten different temples, similar to small Roman temples.

Walpole

Strawberry HillHorace Walpole, John Chute, Richard BentleyTwickenham, England1749-1776.

• Although architecture in the mid- to late-1700s primarily focused on Neoclassical style, there was also a small resurgence of Gothic style. • An early advocate of the Gothic revival was the conservative politician and author Horace Walpole, who published The Castle of Otranto, the first Gothic novel. His novel was a tale of mysterious and supernatural happenings, set in the Middle Ages, and it sparked a fashion for the Gothic.• In 1749, Walpole began redesigning his own residence (with the help of Chute and Bentley), called Strawberry Hill, to resemble the Gothic castles of his novels. • What aspects of Strawberry Hill are Gothic?• Does the architecture resemble any Gothic buildings we studied?

• Neoclassicism also became the preferred style for public sculpture in the new American republic. • The commission for the public sculpture of George Washington was awarded to the leading French Neoclassical sculptor, Jean-Antoine Houdon. • How is this sculpture of Washington the sculptural equivalent of a Grand Manner portrait?• The “column” upon which Washington leans is a bundle of rods with an axe attached, known as a fasces, a Roman emblem of authority. There are 13 rods (one for each of the thirteen original states). • The plow behind Washington alludes to Cincinnatus, a patrician of the early Roman Republic who was elected dictator during a time of war, and resigned his position as soon as victory had been achieved, to return to his farm. • Washington wears the badge of the Society of the Cincinnati, an association founded in 1783 of officers of the revolutionary army who had resumed their peacetime roles.• Washington’s sword is no longer held in hand.

Houdon’s Washington

George WashingtonJean Antoine Houdon

1790. Marble, 6’2”.

• After his death, Washington’s popularity rose until he was venerated as the “father” of the United States. • In 1840, Congress commissioned the American sculptor Horatio Greenough to create a statue of Washington to place under the dome of the capitol building.• Greenough used Houdon’s portrait as his model for the head, but he portrayed Washington as seminude and enthroned, as Phidias depicted Zeus in the famous lost statue he made for Zeus’ temple at Olympia. • Although the colossal statue epitomizes the Neoclassical style, it was not well received, and it was never placed in its originally intended spot. • Shortly thereafter, Neoclassicism fell out of style in favor of Romanticism.

Greenough’s WashingtonGeorge WashingtonHoratio Greenough

1840. Marble. 11’4”.