The Artwork of Versailles

A young Marie Antoinette. By Jean-Baptiste Charpentier le Vieux. Currently hanging in the second antechamber of the Dauphin.

I was going to write a blog post based on the pictures I’d taken of various artwork at the Chateau de Versailles. This was meant to complement the other two posts I’ve created to share the pictures I took at the palace.

However.

I stumbled upon Google Earth Project’s collection of Versailles’ art and was shamed into submission. Google has officially taken over the world. I’m aware this (meaning Google Art not Google world dominance, which is old news) is not something brand new, which is comforting since the end of the Mayan calendar is near. (This whole Google Art Project makes me fear that the end of the Mayan calendar will lead directly into the beginning of the Age of Google. A Google-apocalypse.)

Too bad I didn’t cotton on to the Google Art Project earlier. Everyone from the National Ballet of Canada to the Latvian National Museum of Art are part of this amazing effort.

Here’s the link to the collection of the Chateau de Versailles: http://www.googleartproject.com/collection/palace-of-versailles/

And here, you can do a walk-through of the palace: http://www.googleartproject.com/collection/palace-of-versailles/museumview/

The entirety of the collection is, naturally, worth a look. You can click on the pictures to zoom in, and click details to get some in-depth information about each artwork. Many of them also have educational videos included.

I admit to being most interested in the portraits, especially the ones of people I don’t know well, such as Louis de France, Duke of Burgundy or Maria Leszczinska. But it’s good to see better-known portraits like this one of Louis XIV, or this one of Marie Antoinette and her family.

Read more . . .

Versailles–the Details

To continue the theme of images from Versailles, I have brought out some images of the details of Versailles. These are bits and pieces of the palace on a more human scale. I may at some point get a chance to pinpoint where each photo is from. Until then, enjoy them for what they are!

Boiseries

Boiseries are highly-decorate wall panels, common in 18th-century decor. They were often white with gilt, but of course the design was entirely contingent on the whims of personal tastes. Rooms at the time were designed as a whole, and to-order. Furniture, upholstery, mirrors, molding–it was all custom-made for the room it was put into. Below are some examples of boiseries in Versailles. I was struck by the intricate beauty of the designs. After so many centuries they have a “shabby chic” appeal–just enough age to show character.

Ceilings

If you ever go to Versailles, don’t forget to look up. All the ceilings are painted–every damn inch of them. The style is decidedly rococo, of the time of Louis XIV. It’s all allegorical, and themed. The state apartments, such as the Salon de Mars and the Salon d’Hercule, are painted accordingly with images of their eponymous Greek gods. Everything that isn’t painted is gilded. It makes for a spectacular–but to my eyes, rather gaudy–display. The idea, of course, was to make a statement. These were public rooms. It’s no mistake that the king appears among the gods.

Furniture and Doorways

Of course, no one really lived in the state apartments; they were for display purposes, mostly.  Even the public rooms, however, were part of a large, working household. The more intimate sections of the palace, like the apartments of the Dauphin and Dauphine (in this case referring to Louis XVI’s parents, who died before becoming king and queen) or the apartments of Mesdames Tantes (Louis XVI’s maiden aunts), give a better idea of how life was actually lived. Below are some pictures. The two pictures on the bottom left are from the Queen’s Bedroom. On the left is an open door, through which Marie-Antoinette escaped when the palace was attacked. On the right, if you look closely you can see a doorway which led into the more private rooms beyond.

Versailles: The Dream of a King

Here’s a treat for everyone. This was one of BBC’s wonderful documentaries. I miss a lot of things about the UK, but I think I miss the fantastic nonfiction programming the most. They put on shows with–shocker–real history instead of fluff or stuff that isn’t in the least bit historical (I’m looking at you, History Channel).

The Chateau de Versailles

This program focuses largely on Louis XIV, the Sun King, who of course built Versailles. Louis was extraordinarily important to ancien regime France. He essentially created the court culture, which was the culture of the ruling elite of the country. He chose to bring his nobility to him, to have them wait on him, and to have them squabble with one another over who got to hand him his shirt. In the meantime, they weren’t causing Louis any trouble. When he was very young, those pesky nobles had been causing all kinds of trouble. They called it the Fronde.

A hundred years later or so, at the time of the Affair of the Diamond Necklace, Louis’s rules were still being strictly enforced. The king and queen were put on very public display and their every bodily function was accompanied by a list of rules and precedents. Marie-Antoinette hated the stuffy rules. She wanted to do things her way, meaning less formally. That got her in trouble all around, but that is another story altogether. The point is that even in the time of Jeanne de La Motte, Marie-Antoinette, and all our favorite characters, Louis’s presence was still very much felt.

This documentary is a very nice overview of Louis and his palace, which were intertwined  both during his life and after his death.

Note: This is part one. You’ll have to click on part two when this video ends.