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.

Heads Will Roll

Ancestry.com has recently put up the records of those guillotined during the French Revolution in the time of the Terror.

The monarchy had fallen; in its place were successive governments that all seemed to lose control as quickly as they acquired it. The moment the group in power was overtaken, they were sent to the Dr Guillotine’s machine in their turn.

Not a few (in fact, quite a lot) of the deaths were due to personal vendettas. If you had been quarrelling with your cousin for fifteen years about your debts, and you suddenly found yourself in a position to inform on your cousin, even if it weren’t true . . . well, human nature being what it is, lots of people took that opportunity and accused neighbors and family members who they thought had it coming. In the time of the Terror, real evidence wasn’t usually necessary, and the result was usually a swift chop of a sharp blade. Amongst the most famous of the French Revolution’s victims: Louis XVI (whose occupation is listed as “roi”–I think that might be humor, though it isn’t funny), his sister Madame Elisabeth, and Marie Antoinette. Interestingly, Marie Antoinette is listed as Marie d’Autriche Antoinette–perhaps a nod to her unflattering nickname, La Autrichienne [“the Austrian bitch”]?

HERE, you can search this archive.

Jeanne de La Motte-Valois

Starting with this post, I am going to be writing about the endlessly fascinating Affair of the Diamond Necklace. In this issue: the Comtesse de La Motte, the orchestrator of a diamond theft that rocked the world.

This is all prompted by the historical novel I’m working on. I’m 40k into the story (give or take 401 words; or, rather, take 401 words because it’s at exactly 39,599). Obviously, I’ve gotten a hell of a lot done already, and I’m pretty pleased with what I have. I will have to go back and do a little bit of cleaning up, I think, just to make sure I haven’t inadvertently given the wrong impression about this, that, or the other thing. The story is being set up rather like a thriller or a mystery, though the revelation (which I just wrote) comes around halfway through the story, not at the end. The denouement (or at least the aftermath of poor Nicole’s realization) is going to be much longer. Because, after all, it’s about her, not about the story.

The Characters #1: Jeanne de La Motte-Valois de St Remy (July 1756 – August 1791)

Jeanne de Valois de St Remy was born in the provinces, near the town of Bar-Sur-Aube, France. Her family were impoverished nobility, living in the ramshackle Chateau de Fontette. One of her ancestors, Henri de Saint-Remy, was born in 1557, the illegitimate son of Henri II of France. His descendants were given the surname “Saint-Remy” and this Henri was made Baron of Fontette. Several generations later, the family was in dire financial straits. They had kept themselves alive through a tradition of military service, but Jeanne’s father did not carry on this tradition. He married one of the maids as the family fortunes sank even lower. Jeanne had an older brother, a younger sister who died as a young child, and a sister who was near her age. Her family ended up walking to Paris to try to make their way with only a paper outlining their pedigree. The father died, the mother abandoned her children, and Jeanne and her brother were forced to beg.

According to Jeanne, she carried her little sister on her back and went to the road to Passy, where she met the Marquise de Boulainvilliers, who took her in. She was sent to school (and didn’t like it), worked for increasingly lowly couturiers (and didn’t like it), and was briefly in a convent (and didn’t like it). She returned to Bar-sur-Aube, running away from the convent. There she was supported by the Beugnot family. After what appears to have been what is called a “shotgun wedding” in common parlance, she went to Paris with her husband (Nicolas Marc-Antoine de La Motte), looking to make her fortune by importuning the queen with her sad story. She expected that, as the last (though illegitimate) living Valois, she would be given some support. She was actually given a fairly generous annuity, considering how distant her relation was to the king. She was also to be known as Mademoiselle de Valois, her brother was given the title Baron de Valois, and her sister was to be called Mademoiselle de St Remy.

Her publicity stunts at Versailles grew increasingly desperate. She fainted in front of Madame Elisabeth, King Louis XVI’s sister, and even managed to get into the good graces of Madame Elisabeth and the Comtesse d’Artois, the King’s sister-in-law. Then there was some little scandal involving Jeanne and the Comte d’Artois, her patroness’s husband. She fell out of favor. She went to one minister and refused to leave until she was listened to. This produced a slight increase in her pension. Still, she was in troubled waters.

This is where her story gets interesting. Jeanne, now calling herself a countess, had begun to convince people in about 1783 to 1784 that she was a close friend to the queen. She put around the story that she and the queen were on intimate terms. The pandering of influence was big business in a time and place where all good things flowed from the king and, especially there and then, from queen Marie-Antoinette. Jeanne roped in a Cardinal and Prince of the blood, a man named Prince Louis de Rohan. He had alienated the queen when she was still Dauphine (queen in waiting), and wanted to get back into her favor. Jeanne took advantage of him, bilking him for one hundred twenty thousand francs, a vast sum. She did it by having her “personal secretary” Retaux de Villette forge letters from the queen. The “queen” requested loans because she was more than usually hard up–because, of course, the queen of France typically had such troubles (or not). In any case, Jeanne apparently pocketed the money and showed sudden signs of affluence. She returned briefly to Bar-sur-Aube, lording it over the locals.

Then this all got very interesting.