Charles Lebrun, /
Charles le Brun (1619-90). French painter and art theorist, the
dominant artist of Louis XIV's reign. After training with Vouet he went
to Rome in 1642 and worked under Poussin, becoming a convert to the
latter's theories of art. He returned to Paris in 1646. From 1661 he
became established in the employ of Louis XIV, in 1662 he was raised to
the nobility and named Premier Paintre du roi, and in 1663 he was made
director of the reorganized Academie, which he turned into a channel
for imposing a codified system of orthodoxy in matters of art. His
lectures came to be accepted as providing the official standards of
artistic correctness and, formulated on the basis of the Classicism of
Poussin, gave authority to the view that every aspect of artistic
creation can be reduced to teachable rule and precept. In 1698 his
small illustrated treatise Methode pour apprendre a dessiner les
passions... was posthumously published; in this, again following
theories of Poussin, he purported to codify the visual expression of
the emotions in painting.
Among the most outstanding of his works for the king were the Galerie
d'Apollon at the Louvre (1663), and the famous Galerie des Glaces
(1679-84) and the Great Staircase (1671-78, destroyed in 1752) at
Versailles. His importance in the history of French art is twofold: his
contributions to the magnificence of the Grand Manner of Louis XIV and
his influence in laying the basis of academicism. Many of the leading
French artists of the next generation trained in his studio. Lebrun was
a fine portraitist and an extremely prolific draughtsman.
Le Grand Escalier du château de Versailles. peint par Van der
Meulen et Charles Le Brun Œuvre d'art originale datant du 18e
siècle a été réalisée par l'artiste
Louis
de Surugue (1686 - 1762)
These are from Le Grand Escalier de Versailles./The Grand Staircase of
Chateau Versailles, and the Ambassadors Stairway ./Le Grand Escalier du Château Versailles,
dit Escalier des Ambassadeurs] [Paris, De l'Imprimerie royale., nd
The collection of engravings known as the Cabinet du Roi
originated with Louis XIV's minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619-1683),
who commissioned engravers to create designs for the King's tapestries
and furniture. Colbert set up a workshop and repository called the
Chalcography of the Louvre to employ engravers and printers, and to
conserve the copperplates produced for the engravings. As early as
1662, engravings were made to record special celebrations given by the
King at Versailles. They were well-received, and by an order in council
in 1667, an enormous artistic endeavour was undertaken to record the
King's collections of paintings, sculpture, and coins, as well as plans
of the gardens and buildings and the interior decoration of the royal
Residences.. Beginning in 1670, these engravings were published in
volumes and presented as gifts to visiting dignitaries. To offset the
cost of production, Colbert offered restrikes of them for sale, and in
1727, the first complete set of the Cabinet du Roi engravings was
published in 23 volumes. . The engravings in this fifth volume of the
set, 52 of which are taken from the interior decoration of the Chateau
Versailles, include: the entranceway with the staircase and surrounding
frescoes, the frescoes on the ceiling of the gallery Ice, and the
tables on the ceilings of the Salon of the Salon of War and Peace, at
either end of the gallery.For more than 30 years, Charles Le Brun was
the prime overseer of art works created and manufactured for Colbert
and Louis XIV. In the Chateau Versailles, he decorated the Hall of
Mirrors, the Great Flats King and Queen, and the Stairway Ambassadors
at the entrance to the palace. A mammoth artistic project, the
decoration included the painting of vaults, niches, frescoes, statues
and medallions all showing highlights from Louis' reign (1661-1678).
Copperplates were made after Le Brun, Massé and Antoine Coypel's
designs by engravers Audran, Baudet, Beauvais, Cars, Desplaces, Dupuis,
Simoneau, Surugue and Tardieu, among others .This is sold as a
completet item suitable for breaking or for restoration ; many of the
later plates have old water marks but the paper is remarkably thick and
high quality to survive this. 16 from the original 24 pages .. .sheet size 66 cm
x 92 cm size of plate mark varies;
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