The Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture (French Academy of Painting and Sculpture)—perhaps the single most influential art institution in history—governed the arts in France for more than 150 years, from its founding in 1648 until its abolition in 1793. Christian Michel's sweeping study presents an authoritative, in-depth analysis of the Académie’s history and legacy. The Académie Royale assembled nearly all of the important French artists working at the time, maintained a virtual monopoly on teaching and exhibitions, enjoyed a priority in obtaining royal commissions, and deeply influenced the artistic landscape in France. Yet the institution remains little understood today: all commentary on it, during its existence and since its abolition, is based on prejudices, both favorable and critical, that have shaped the way the institution has been appraised. This book takes a different approach. Rather than judging the Académie Royale, Michel unravels existing critical discourse to consider the nuances and complexities of the academy’s history, reexamining its goals, the shifting power dynamics both within the institution and in the larger political landscape, and its relationship with other French academies and guilds.

For the first time, a critical selection of the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture’s highly influential conférences is available in English. Between 1667 and 1792, the artists and amateurs of the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture in Paris lectured on the Académie’s conférences, foundational documents in the theory and practice of art. These texts and the principles they embody guided artistic practice and art theory in France and throughout Europe for two centuries. In the 1800s, the Académie’s influence waned, and few of the 388 Académie lectures were translated into English. Eminent scholars Christian Michel and Jacqueline Lichtenstein have selected and annotated forty-two of the most representative lectures, creating the first authoritative collection of the conférences for readers of English. Essential to understanding French art of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, these lectures reveal what leading French artists looked for in a painting or sculpture, the problems they sought to resolve in their works, and how they viewed their own and others’ artistic practice.

From its establishment in 1648 until its disbanding in 1793 after the French Revolution, the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture was the centre of the Parisian art world. Taking the reader behind the scenes of this elite bastion of French art theory, education, and practice, and drawing on both art-historical and anthropological frames of analysis, this engaging study uncovers the fascinating histories – official and unofficial – of that artistic community.

This monograph examines the wide artistic production of Louis XIV's most prolific and powerful artist, Charles Le Brun (1619-1690), illustrating the magnificence of his paintings and focusing particularly on the interiors and decorative art works produced according to his designs. In his joint capacities of Premier peintre du roi, director of the Gobelins manufactory and rector of the Acad mie royale de peinture et de sculpture, Le Brun exercised a previously unprecedented influence on the production of the visual arts - so much so that some scholars have repeatedly described him as 'dictator' of the arts in France. The Sovereign Artist explores how Le Brun operated in his diverse fields of activities, linking and juxtaposing his portraiture, history painting and pictorial theory with his designs for architecture, tapestries, carpets and furniture. It argues that Le Brun sought to create a repeatable and easily recognizable visual language associated with Louis XIV, in order to translate the king's political claims for absolute power into a visual form. How he did this is discussed through a series of individual case studies ranging from Le Brun's lost equestrian portrait of Louis XIV, and his involvement in the Querelle du coloris at the Acad mie, to his scheme for 93 Savonnerie carpets for the Grande Galerie at the Louvre, his Histoire du roy tapestry series, his decoration of the now destroyed Escalier des Ambassadeurs at Versailles and the dramatic destruction of the Sun King's silver furniture. One key theme is the relation between the unity of the visual arts, to which Le Brun aspired, and the strong hierarchical distinctions he made between the liberal arts and the mechanical crafts: while his lectures at the Acad mie advocated a visual and conceptual unity in painting and architecture, they were also a means by which he attempted to secure the newly gained status of painting as a liberal art, and therefore to distinguish it from the mechanical crafts which he oversaw the production of at the Gobelins. His artistic and architectural aspirations were comparable to those of his Roman contemporary Gianlorenzo Bernini, summoned to Paris in 1665 to design the Louvre's East fa ade and to create a portrait bust of Louis XIV. Bernini's failure to convince the king and Colbert of his architectural scheme offered new opportunities for Le Brun and his French contemporaries to prove themselves capable of solving the architectural problems of the Louvre and to transform it into a palace appropriate "to the grandeur and the magnificence of the prince who was] to inhabit it" (Jean-Baptiste Colbert to Nicolas Poussin in 1664). The comparison between Le Brun and Bernini not only illustrates how France sought artistic supremacy over Italy during the second half of the 17th century, but further helps to demonstrate how Le Brun himself wanted to be perceived: beyond acting as a translator of the king's artistic ambition, the artist appears to have sought his own sovereign authority over the visual arts.

Elisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun (1755–1842) was one of the finest eighteenth-century french painters and among the most important women artists of all time. Celebrated for her expressive portraits of French royalty and aristocracy, and especially of her patron Marie Antoinette, Vigée Le Brun exemplified success and resourcefulness in an age when women were rarely allowed either. Because of her close association with the queen Vigée Le Brun was forced to flee France during the French Revolution. For twelve years she traveled throughout Europe, painting noble sitters in the courts of Naples, Russia, Austria, and Prussia. She returned to France in 1802, under the reign of Emperor Napoleon I, where her creativity continued unabated. This handsome volume details Vigée Le Brun's story, portraying a talented artist who nimbly negotiated a shifting political and geographic landscape. Essays by international scholars address the ease with which this self-taught artist worked with monarchs, the nobility, court officials and luminaries of arts and letters, many of whom attended her famous salons. The position of women artists in Europe and at the Salons of the period is also explored, as are the challenges faced by Vigée Le Brun during her exile. The ninety paintings and pastels included in this volume attest to Vigée Le Brun's superb sense of color and expression. They include exquisite depictions of counts and countesses, princes and princesses alongside mothers and children, including the artist herself and her beloved daughter, Julie. A chronology of the life of Vigée Le Brun and a map of her travels accompany the text, elucidating the peregrinations of this remarkable, independent painter.

This lavishly illustrated book explores the impact of the poet Homer on four centuries of French artists through the lens of the Ecole's superb collections of paintings, prints and sculptures.

Chance ordained that Denis Diderot (1713-1784) was not only a philosopher, playwright and writer, but also a salonnier. In other words, an art critic. In 1759, his friend Grimm entrusted him with a project that forced him to acquire "thoughtful notions concerning painting and sculpture" and to refine "art terms, so familiar in his words yet so vague in his mind". Diderot wrote artistic reviews of exhibitions – Salons – that were organized bi-annually at the Louvre by the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture. These reviews, published in the Correspondence Littéraire, were Diderot’s unique contribution to art criticism in France. He fulfilled his task of salonnier on nine occasions, despite occasional dips in his enthusiasm and self-confidence. Compiled and presented by Jean Szenec, this anthology helps the contemporary reader to familiarize himself with Diderot’s aesthetic thought in all its greatness. It includes eight illustrations and is followed by texts from Jean Starobinski, Michel Delon, and Arthur Cohen. ‘On Art and Artists’ is translated by John Glaus, professor of French and an amateur expert of the XVIIIth century.