Chapter 21

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Horatio Greenough, George Washington, 1840. Marble, 11' 4" high. Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.

Rococo was centered around

Important woman

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Jean-Antoine Houdon, George Washington, 1788-1792. Marble, 6' 2" high. State Capitol, Richmond.

This simple family scene is Microcosm. This theme of the "good-mother" is a direct reference to Mary Antoinette, who was not a good mother. The good mother will keep a happy household and keep order. Things will progress the way they should in a marriage. This is what a good mother and father would be.

Jean-Baptiste Greuze, Village Bride, 1761. Oil on canvas, 3' x 3' 10 1/2". Musée du Louvre, Paris.

There's no one happier than these middle-class, dirty people. They don't fret about the state of the world. They live a simple life. There's an overt sentimentality here and an imposition of thought that this natural world of the lower/middle classes would be the "normal" state. There's this nostalgia. Palettes are earth-tones. Lighting is quiet. It's a very domestic scene.

Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin, Grace, 1740. Oil on canvas, 1' 7" x 1' 3". Musée du Louvre, Paris.

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Jean-Honoré Fragonard, The Swing, 1766. Oil on canvas, 2' 8 5/8" x 2' 2". Wallace Collection, London.

This painting comes from a series of six paintings which were satire narratives.

William Hogarth, The Tête à Tête, from Marriage à la Mode, ca. 1745. Oil on canvas, 2' 4" x 3". National Gallery, London.

Neoclassical art espoused (adopted/supported) a return to the art of ___________________

Ancient Greece and Rome

We're looking at the artist in the act of painting. She is saying "this is me, I am a painter. Both students are female (which was unusual). We can't see the painting she's working on, but she does have the tools for the job. The students are at the apex of the triangle. This artist was also a member of the French royal academy. There is a bust of her father in the background (and he was also an artist). The artist's muse is a man: her father.

Adélaïde Labille-Guiard, Self-Portrait with Two Pupils, 1785. Oil on canvas, 6' 11" x 4' 11 1/2". Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (gift of Julia A. Berwind, 1953).

The artist here was born wealthy and she married a baron. Because they were Catholic, they did not get a divorce, but she just left and eventually became a member of the academy. This portrait is about the classical "good mother" story. The way that this differs from rococo is the architecture and fashion (they're painted very classical here). The figures are not elongated or in ballet-like poses. The lighting is softer here. We do not get the foliage of rococo. There are tighter brush-strokes. When something is "painterly," the brush strokes are very loose. This painting is more linear.

Angelica Kauffman, Cornelia Presenting Her Children as Her Treasures, or Mother of the Gracchi, ca. 1785. Oil on canvas, 3' 4" x 4' 2". Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond (the Adolph D. and Wilkins C. Williams Fund).

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Antoine Watteau, L'Indifférent, ca. 1716. Oil on canvas, 10" x 7". Musée du Louvre, Paris.

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Antoine Watteau, Return from Cythera, 1717. Oil on canvas, 4' 3" x 6' 4 1/2". Musèe du Louvre, Paris.

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Antoine Watteau, Signboard of Gersaint, 1721. Oil on canvas, 5' 4" x 10' 1". Schloss Charlottenburg, Berlin.

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Antonio Canaletto, Riva degli Schiavoni, Venice, ca. 1735-1740. Oil on canvas, 1' 6 1/2" x 2' 7/8". Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo.

West was a member of the British Royal Academy. He was trained in English. He was commissioned to do a history painting. He specializes in these history painters. History painters were the top of the food chain. That's what you wanted to be if you painted. There's this whole hierarchy. This is a painting of the British victory over the French for control over Quebec. West was showing General Wolfe as a sort of martyr. The whole painting is a metaphor. The British are on the sunny side but on the French side you have a passing storm.

Benjamin West, Death of General Wolfe, 1771. Oil on canvas, 4' 11 1/2" x 7' National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa (gift of the Duke of Westminster, 1918).

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Cupid a Captive by François Boucher

Jacques Louis David painted the ____ to provide inspiration and encouragement to revolutionary forces.

Death of Marat

The artist here was trying to show her as the good mother. It was her job to sway the audience.

Elisabeth-Louise Vigée-Lebrun, Marie Antoinette and Her Children, 1787. Oil on canvas, 9' 1/2" x 7' 5/8". Musée National du Château de Versailles, Versailles.

A major force of political, social, and economic change in the 18th century was the ____.

Enlightenment

Average people doing average stuff

Genre painting

How does Benjamin West's The Death of General Wolfe illustrate the artist's radical approach to the academic tradition of Neoclassical history painting?

It depicts a contemporary subject

Which of the following works illustrates the principles of the Enlightenment that art should be didactic and should strive to improve public morals?

Jacques Louis David, Oath of the Horatii

The artist whose work best spoke for the French Revolution was which of the following?

Jacques-Louis David

David is using this metaphor of Marat at a martyr just as Christ was.

Jacques-Louis David, Death of Marat, 1793. Oil on canvas, 5' 5" x 4' 2 1/2". Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels.

This painting shows the father of three sons who had volunteered to represent their homeland, which is very noble. On the right side, you have these wilted woman, and on the right side you have these tall men. Stylistically, you'd recognize this as neo-classical from the architecture in the background. There's not as much focus on the opulence of the textiles and fabrics. The figures, the bodies, are sculptural. The lighting is more dramatic. Historically, one of the brothers wins and the first female in the painting is engaged to the volunteer from the other side. Her brother wins and ends up putting her to death for treason. Anyway, this whole painting is theatrical. Lots of movement and lots of power. When this was presented in the salon, it was well-received by the French. After the salon, they produced a play. The play was about the sacrifice of the individual for the good of the whole. At the end of the play, the actors, stood in this play in reference to this painting. The French LOVED it. Basically, they were doing the Tableau/Mannequin Challenge.

Jacques-Louis David, Oath of the Horatii, 1784. Oil on canvas, 10' 10" x 13' 11". Musée du Louvre, Paris.

This artist was self-taught, American, and he grew up in Boston. His father died and his mother was a single mother. His mother remarried a man with a gallery, so the artist trained himself in art because he had a lot of exposure to it. In the painting, we see the tools of Revere's trade. It's a very plain portrait. No metaphor, no allegory, nothing. It's boring, American portraiture.

John Singleton Copley, Paul Revere, ca. 1768-1770. Oil on canvas, 2' 11 1/8" x 2' 4". Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (gift of Joseph W., William B., and Edward H. R. Revere).

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Joseph Wright of Derby, A Philosopher Giving a Lecture at the Orrery, ca. 1763-1765. Oil on canvas, 4' 10" x 6' 8". Derby Museums and Art Gallery, Derby.

It was important if you went on a study-away. Back then, it was absolutely necessary for you to be cultured. How do you prove that you've traveled? You bring back:

Prints of scenes where you've been

Where did the important and successful people gather? (Networking for the wealthy) This is how artists made their way up the social chain.

Salon

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Sir Joshua Reynolds Lord Heathfield, 1787. Oil on canvas, 4' 8" x 3' 9". National Gallery, London.

Which of the following groups embraced Neoclassicism?

The Enlightenment Philosophers

Angelika Kauffman's Cornelia Pointing to her Children as Her Treasures expresses the idea of __________, a popular theme among eighteenth century audiences who preferred Classical subjects that taught lessons of civic virtue.

The good mother

This is a natural woman in a natural setting (still very rococo)

Thomas Gainsborough, Mrs. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, 1787. Oil on canvas, 7' 2 5/8" x 5' 5/8". National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (Andrew W. Mellon Collection).

The American leader ____ embraced Neoclassicism because of its associations with important virtues such as morality, idealism, and patriotism.​

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson believed that all Americans should be educated, but also go back to the farm. Monticello becomes this interesting change. This morph between neo-classical and French Classical. Jefferson was later asked to design a building for the University of Virginia.

Thomas Jefferson, Monticello, Charlottesville, Virginia, 1770-1806.

Jefferson copied the Roman Pantheon.

Thomas Jefferson, Rotunda and Lawn (looking north), University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, 1819-1826.

Which of the following stylistic features best describes Rococo Art?

feathery brushstrokes, pastel palette, ballet-like poses, mythological subjects

Exposure to the art treasures of Italy on the Grand Tour played a major role in the rise of ____.

neoclassicism

The group of philosophers known as the ____ believed that the ills of humanity could be remedied by applying reason and common sense to problems.

philosophes

In Pilgrimage to Cythera, by Watteau, the elegant and sweet ____ are hallmarks of the artist's style.

poses of the figures

__________ began as a movement in French architectural decoration, characterized by a lighthearted frivolous mood among the French upper class.

rococo

There are many layers of paint for interest. Painted in earthy-tones, even lighting. No high-drama. No bright theatricality. Favorite painter of Marie Antoinette. Vigée-Lebrun was a member of the art academy. At that point, you did have to be a man to be admitted into the French royal academy. She was one of the first woman admitted in, but she was kicked out after the French Revolution.

Élisabeth-Louise Vigée-Lebrun, Self-Portrait, 1790. Oil on canvas, 8' 4" x 6' 9". Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

These are scenes that rich people would want to see depicted - entertainment or rural festivals. Feathery brushwork, ballet-poses, perfumed air, attention to material stuff. Where the satin shines and the velvet looks like velvet. Antoine Watteau's depiction of the amusements and entertainments of the upper classes is called a ____.

​fête galante