Anouchka Paints - Trip to Le Louvre

Greetings, all!

As both of you may already be aware, Habibi and I are preparing for my upcoming sabbatical this fall.  (Just because I am not a college professor and do not have a "real" job does not mean that I am not entitled to a sabbatical.)

Now, don't expect my Pulitzer prize winning work upon my return.  You cannot force genius.  Also, you should learn to be more patient because I am very busy and important.  Now enough about you.  Let's talk more about me.

You may wonder where someone like me would choose to take her breaks.  T'es fou?  Ben, je voyagerai en France, bien sûr!  Yes, you read me right.  Habibi and I are going to France this fall.  SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!

I'm a little excited.

In any case, it goes without saying that we will be visiting Paris during our stay chez les gaulois.  Being the art history expert of our tour group (of two), I am responsible for planning our trip to le Louvre.

Le Louvre (and small pyramid by I.M. Pei)

For those of you who have been to le Louvre, you will recall that the museum isn't that big...it's massive.  There is no way on earth that you could see every work on display in an afternoon, a day, a week, or even a month.  However, despite my profound love for art and history, even I cannot stomach much more than a couple of hours in any museum.  For this reason, we will be visiting King Louis' old stompin' grounds on a mission.

After scouring all of my old art history notes to determine which of my favorite works are actually housed at le Louvre, here is a list of masterpieces that we will be examining from the academic perspective of highly acclaimed tourists.  (This list is not exhaustive.  I've just highlighted a few of my old friends here.)

Amusez-vous bien with Anouchka's Museum Guide to Le Louvre!  (PS - Sorry I'm too lazy to include pictures.  You'll just have to go to Paris.  Or Google.)

Anouchka's Museum Guide to Le Louvre

Divided into 6 subsets (as determined by Professor Richard Bretteli of the University of Texas at

Dallas; Museum Masterpieces: The Louvre, produced by The Great Courses)

1. Painting

• 2^nd / top level
  • South/Italian (+ ancient) – Seine/South side (GO IN THE MORNING!) **
  • North/French (+ medieval) – North side **
  • French Revolution – Mid 19^th Century - “wrong” side of the Louvre **

2. Sculpture (Displayed historically) **

2. Ancient Mediterranean Art (Displayed historically)
   
3. Egyptian and Near Eastern Antiquity (Displayed historically)
   
4. Graphic Arts (Displayed historically)
   
5. Decorative Arts (Displayed historically)

**Represented in this guide

ITALIAN / SOUTHERN EUROPEAN (+ ANCIENT) PAINTINGS

Italian Early-High Renaissance

CIMABUE

Madonna and Child Surrounded by Angels

• Studied Madonna Enthroned with Angels & Prophets, 1280s
• Teacher of Giotto
• Italo-Byzantine in color
• “Old” baby Jesus
• Elongated figures

LEONARDO DA VINCI

Virgin of the Rocks

• Altarpiece, ca. 1485
• Angel tutoring John the Baptist
  • Fra Filippo Lippi – similar rock formations and use of atmospheric perspective (Madonna and Child with Angels)
• Darkened “blue” gown – precise shadow effect
• Chiaroscuro
• No halos
• Connection between all characters (gestures, gazes)
• Pyramidal perspective

Mary

John                 Angel

           Jesus

Virgin and Child with St. Anne

• Studied Cartoon for Virgin and Child with St. Anne, 1505-1507
• Sketch – obscures original idea
• Generations of Christ: Grandmother (St. Anne), Mother (Virgin Mary), and Baby (Jesus)
• Chiaroscuro and sfumato – blends figures (shadows, eyes)
• “Half smile of contentment” as seen in the Mona Lisa

Mona Lisa

• 1503-1505
• Giocondo – Mona Lisa's husband
• Framed by columns
• In motion - twist (profile, ¾, frontal)
• Eyes in same location as horizon
• Mona Lisa in the process of smiling
• Darkened shadows (clothes especially) – face (chiaroscuro & sfumato)
• Reaction to us - “Hi Mona Lisa!”

RAPHAEL

Virgin and Child with John the Baptist / La Belle Jardiniere

• Studied Madonna of the Meadow, ca. 1506
• Emulation of Leonardo Da Vinci's cartoon (different background)
• Sfumato and chiaroscuro in her face
  • Less mysterious, striking or bold as Leo's →
• Pyramidal

GIORGIONE

Fête Champêtre

• Studied Pastoral Symphony, ca. 1508
• Possible allegory of poetry – courtly, pastoral and amorous poetry
  • Vs. Michelangelo's Expulsion – less muscle tone, uses chiaroscuro, figures are a part of their setting instead of only focus, faces are covered in shadow
• Impasto

Italian Baroque

CARAVAGGIO

Death of the Virgin

• 1602
• Rejected by monks for altar, Purchased by Duke of Mantua
• Doesn't depict the assumption of the Virgin - shows her dead (usually shown as “dormition”)
• Red curtain – metaphor?
  • Divine shows itself more subtly, perhaps? (not necessarily secularizing the divine)
• Mary – little halo
• Mary Magdalene (?) weeping – hair suggests her identity (MM usually is blonde)
• Expressions: left half-said (all expressions)
  • We figure it out again
• Timanthes (Ancient Greek painter; famous for ingenium [wit, ingenuity] in suggesting more than  he actually shows) – hides biggest grief
  • Leads beyond degree of sadness
  • Veils sadness (Caravaggio does this too)
  • Cleverness vs. suggested simplicity/naiveté

GUERCINO

Vision of St. Jerome

• 1619 – 1620
• Challenge – communicate the intensity of stimulus and response
• Very baroque – senses (sound)
• Caravaggio-like
  • Compare: Guido Reni's St. Jerome
  • Light vs. shadow
  • No eye contact
  • Can't see Jerome's face

FRENCH / NORTHERN EUROPEAN (+ MEDIEVAL) PAINTINGS

16^th Century

ALBRECT DURER (German)

Self-Portrait

• Copy at the Louvre – 1493
• Studied Self-Portrait, ca. 1500
  • Northern painting – reflection, texture
  • Uses oil glazing to bring out different textures
    • Moist eyes, soft skin, oiled hair, soft fur
  • Vs. Jan Van Eycke's Self-Portrait
    • He looks straight on – most portraits at this time were turned (Mona Lisa, Castiglione, etc.)
    • Jesus/Good etc. looked at us straight on in former pictures
    • Alter deus (other god)
    • Maybe because the people in Italy treated him like a gentleman (unlike the people from home)

French, Flemish and Dutch Baroque

NICOLAS POUSSIN (French)

Echo and Narcissus

• 1630
• Echo turns into a rock, Narcissus (dead) turns into flower
• Eros indicates love/desire
  • Death = desire unfulfilled
• Softly rendered moment of cycle
  • Life – death
  • Narcissus and Echo die unfulfilled ; flowers bloom, die...

Arcadian Shepherds

• 1638-1640
• Et in arcadia ego = I also in Arcadia ______ (No one knows! Perhaps death?)
• Shepherds discover the reality of death
  • Skull, mouse, flies (in Guercino version???)
  • No skulls in this – who is speaking? Death? Person in tomb?
    • Same idea with more subtlety – dead person was in Arcadia vs. death itself in Arcadia
• Clarity in gestures, poses
  • Text, figures almost read like ciphers as well
• Primitive – shepherds read by feeling it out
  • Touch affirms certainty of this sentence
  • Verifies reality of death, understanding
• Vanitas:
  • “In death there is life” ; precious things are bounded in time ; leaves, life – vanitas, death
  • Shadow as vanitas
    • He points at the shadow, the shadow points back
• More classicized than other Arcadian Shepherds
• Figures on same plane – friezelike
  • Tomb is like a backdrop – only slight angle
• One doesn't see, one reads, one verifies, woman reassures
• Female – goddess? Allegory (wisdom/history)? We don't know.
• Tells story with figures in landscape →
  • Raphael, Carracci – Landscape with Flight Into Egypt

Self Portrait

• 1650
• Makes to send to French friend
• Academically dressed, holds book
• Inscription (date on it!)
• Allegorical figure in back
• Setting of frames – frames his eyes
  • And allegorical figure with eye on crown
• Shadow on inscription – carries idea of mortality
• Represents pittura, painting
  • Someone reaches up and embraces her
  • His gaze, her gaze – at things unseen
• Grasping/embracing metaphorically (vs. physically)
• Pouce – thumb print (Thumb, Poussin?)
• Not a full embrace of mystery man in background

VALENTIN DE BOULOGNE (French)

Concert

• 1620
• Dutch/Caravaggism
  • Similar to Supper Party (Gerrit van Honthorst)
• Eye contact with characters
• No real interaction with each other
• Isolation from surroundings/culture (table = block with Roman relief)
• Painting by a foreigner in Rome
• Antiquity on table

GEORGES DE LA TOUR (French)

The Penitent Mary Magdalene

• 1640
• Flickering candle = life is brief
• Skull = hardness, finality of death
  • Holds her own skull
  • Skull looks back at her from mirror
• Generalized outline (vs. Ter Brugghen's melancholia)
  • More “silent”
• Flame wavers, she sighs

PETER PAUL RUBENS (Flemish)

Maria de Medici Series (4 pieces)

• 1622 – 1625
• Historical base, events
  • Embellishes and elaborates
  • Exaggeration, hyberbole, allegory
• Birth of Maria de Medici
  • Personifications of childbirth etc. with baby
  • Nods to Michelangelo →
  • Showing off painting skills
• Presentation of the Portrait
  • Henri IV falls in love with her
  • He's a warrior – cupids play with his armor because he's forgotten about love, etc.
• Arrival of Maria de Medici at Marseilles/Debarkation at Marseilles
  • Commissioned by Maria de Medici to illustrate her marriage to Henri IV
  • Personification of France meeting her (along with fame, etc.)
  • Neptune calms the seas
  • Myriads – Trio of women pulling in ship (Feminized version of Lacoön)
    • Rubens had help – “Rubens flesh” (painted by his workers???)
    • Oil sketches (usually on panel) – figure out composition more quickly
    • Little bits added by Rubens? (drops on butt, splashing water – northern oil paints)
• Entry into Lyon
  • Personification of the city (lions – Lyon)
  • Jupiter, Juno, Goddess of Marriage (portraits of Henri IV and Maria)
    • Risky: Jupiter wasn't a faithful husband
    • slinging leg over eagle – Raphael's Loggio of Psyche, Carracci's Farnese Gallery
      • Love makes him smitten with her

WILLEM KALF (Flemish)

Still-Life

• 1660
• Imported items – luxury
• Pronkstilleven
  • Veiled in darkness, desire to have these objects
• Also items of vanitas (ex: watch)
  • Our pleasure is all contained in a mortal span
• Not “who cares, we're gonna die anyway,” but more “these are precious because they aretemporary”
• Stimulates senses, in our space (both v. baroque)
• Light penetrates differently through each material
  • Glass, liquid, lemon, fruit, etc.

ANTHONY VAN DYCK (Flemish)

Portrait of Charles I, Le Roi à la Chasse

• 1635
• Tired horse, foamy mouth
• Reminiscent of horse in Titian's Adoration of the Magi
  • Bows to king?
• Reminiscent of Rubens' Triumph of Rome

REMBRANDT (Dutch)

Supper at Emmaus

• ca. 1628-1630
• “Low relief” - we see surface texture of painting
• Shadows
• Secular vs. holy
  • Secular woman removing bread from table (regular, everyday thing)
  • Stranger is Jesus
  • Christ appears and disappears from us like he does for the people in this painting →
    • Christ is a silhouette as he disappears
  • Gospel scene – blindness, sight
  • Disciple in shadow (bottom) – praying

Bathsheba with David's Letter

• 1654
• David is unseen – watches her as we watch her
• We are in David's position / Our perspective is the same as David's
  • Very baroque – connects us to the painting
• To best understand message - “stuns” us, makes us think about what he did

FRENCH 17^th CENTURY CLACISSISM AND ROCOCO

J-H FRAGONARD

Bathers

• ca. 1765
• Student of Boucher
• Female flesh in water?
• Water, reeds
• Paint is just left on the surface
  • Caresses the canvas like the water caresses the female flesh
  • Like Rubens' MdM series

FRENCH NEO-CLASSICISM

JACQUES-LOUIS DAVID

The Oath of the Horatii

• 1784-1785
• Made for Louis XVI
• Made while J-L David was in Rome
• 3 arches, 3 objects each
• Men (Neo-classicism) overcome women (Rococo)
• Vs. Poussin's Arcadian Shepherds
  • Frieze
  • Read (time unfolds)

FRENCH ROMANTIC PAINTING

J-A-D INGRES

Apotheosis of Homer

• 1827
• Elevation of a mortal to god status
• Raphael's “School of Athens” (Michelangelo, Poussin, etc.)
• Athens – All philosophers
• Homer – all have genius (secular altarpiece)

THEODORE GERICAULT

The Raft of the Medusa

• 1818-1819
• 23 feet long
• Romantic (notion of sublime, etc.), scandalous story
  • T.G. read the publication and interviewed survivors, drew dead bodies (practice)
• Sail of the ship in the distance = false hope
• Light/dark (like Rubens' Elevation of Christ)

EUGENE DELACROIX

Death of Sardanapalus

• 1826
• Sardanapalus →
  • Ancient Assyrian ruler
  • Killed all his living goods so conquering enemies couldn't have them
  • Homer = Noble (vs. Sardanapalus = exotic, mad genius)
• No perspective (floors, walls, us)
• Impasto – painted quickly (it appears to be), though all marks were carefully planned

SCULPTURE / ANCIENT MEDITERRANEAN ART

Sarcophagus of a Married Couple

• Studied Sarcophagus of a Reclining Couple from Cerveteri, ca. 520 BC
• Coffin made of terracotta
• 4 feet tall, cast in 4 sections
• Etruscan interest in the individual – interest in individual expression (torso and above)
  • Lively, expressive faces
  • Affection between figures – comradeship / intimacy
• Husband and wife on couch – role of women ?
  • At a banquet
  • Lively gesticulation, sign language – communication with the living
• Hair/clothing styles

Venus de Milo

• ca. 150-125 BC
• Found on island of Melos (Milo)
• Sexualized, erotic tension
• Strip tease? Suggestion? Arms once holding fabric?