Lot n° 123
Estimation :
6000 - 8000
EUR
Joseph Roques (1757-1847)
Minerva protecting France presented by the Duke of Bordeaux
Oil on canvas
96 x 48 cm.
Bibliography :
- J. Penent, "Toulouse et le Néo-classicisme" in Patrimoine public et Révolution française, Toulouse, 1989, p.268
Interesting rediscovery of a modello, probably for a monumental work, by this rare neoclassical artist from Toulouse, first master of Ingres.
Births in high aristocratic families - especially royal families - in addition to giving rise to public festivities (thanksgiving masses, banquets, balls, fireworks, etc.) are regularly the pretext for artistic commissions celebrating the power or blessing enjoyed by a dynasty.
In France, we remember that Rubens, in his 1621-1625 cycle dedicated to the life of Marie de Médicis commissioned for the Palais du Luxembourg, commemorated, in turn, the birth of Marie de Médicis (Louvre, inv. 1770) and the birth of Louis XIII (Louvre, inv. 1776) in an allegorical representation.
This pictorial tradition continued throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, from Gabriel Blanchard (Allegory of the birth of Louis XIV, 1663, Versailles, inv. MV7039) to François-Guillaume Ménageot (Allegory of the birth of the Dauphin, 1781, Versailles, inv. MV 6766).
The birth of Henri d'Artois, Duke of Bordeaux, on September 29, 1820, was a political event of considerable significance: on the one hand, it was the first birth of a male in the Bourbon family of France since 1785 (and the birth of the future Louis XVII), allowing the hope of a continuation of the dynasty, on the other hand, it came six months after the assassination of his father, the duke of Berry (1778-1820), who was then the only "male in a state of procreation" in the family.
This "child of the miracle" will enjoy from then on a popularity rarely noticed, that the fragile regime of the Restoration will know how to encourage.
If many allegorical compositions were created to celebrate this birth, they were most often made in print, in order to facilitate their distribution.
Among the most notable painted allegories on the subject is that of Jean-Charles Tardieu-Cochin (Rouen, Musée des Beaux-Arts, inv.1821.1), exhibited at the 1822 Salon.
Among the other visual devices put in place to excite popular jubilation and magnify the dynasty in place, let us quote the "monumental transparencies", a "novelty" popularized under the First French Empire.
In Paris, one of the most important of this kind is remembered, installed in the large arcade on the second floor of the entrance pavilion of the Senate, which was used on the occasion of Bonaparte's second marriage and the birth of his heir. The designs for these two transparencies were by Louis Laffite (1770-1828). The architect Nicolas Goulet describes the first, in 1810: "The arcade of the second order was filled by a large transparent subject, representing the senate, under the emblem of a Minerva, leaning on the sacred deposit of the constitution of the empire, holding with one hand the symbol of Prudence, and receiving with the other the act of alliance of LL. MM., that he two geniuses present" (Fêtes a l'occasion du mariage de S. M. Napoléon..., Paris, Soyer, 1810. pl.13, 14).
For the second event, the preparatory watercolor is preserved in the castle of Malmaison (inv. MM.40.47.3246): Minerva watches, helmeted, over the cradle of the newborn and holds out an olive branch.
Our modello, which also features an allegory of Minerva (who has twice been associated with the Senate), and which has the same feature of an arched upper part, could correspond to a similar commission, most likely unrealized, for this famous archway of the Senate entrance pavilion.
It is also interesting to note that the figure of Minerva seems to be a quotation of the one made in marble in 1817 by Roques' fellow Toulouse artist, Louis-Antoine Romagnesi (1776-1852), which is now in the Musée des Augustins (inv. 2004 1 212).
Joseph Roques, a painter with a long career that began in 1772, witnessed the many political upheavals that shook France, and his city of Toulouse. Although he had, in his time, executed paintings of rather "Girondine" inspiration: La Fête de la Fédération (1790 - Musée des Augustins, inv. RO 243), La mort de Marat (1793 - Musée des Augustins, inv. RO 244), La fin de la Montagne (1796); he seems to have been one of those who welcomed, in 1815, the Restoration of the Bourbons with a polite enthusiasm.
One of his most poignant self-portraits, around 1815, represents him holding a portrait drawn by Louis XVIII (Musée des Augustins, inv. 51 1 1).
Toulouse had given a very warm welcome to the Duke of Angouleme in 1814, as well as to his wife, the Duchess, in 1815.
When the Duke of Angouleme returned from the Spanish campaign
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