THE ART NEWSPAPER Number 271, September 2015 55 FEATURES

LOUIS XIV: HIS MANIA FOR THE CULT OF SELF On the 300th anniversary of the Sun King’s death, the writer of a forthcoming biography of France’s most celebrated monarch reflects on the spectacular flourishing of creativity in his reign, and on Louis’s passion for self-commemoration, in everything from medals to sculptures and buildings. By Philip Mansel

his winter, the 300th anniver- Statue of Louis XIV (1715) by Antoine Coysevox, of splendour. A better patron than ruler, he of the aristocrat Madame de Sévigné. Foreign sary of the death of Louis XIV in Notre-Dame Cathedral, . Below, the king’s commissioned, and in some cases helped design, monarchs like the kings of England and Sweden or is commemorated in a massive personal jewel casket, made by Jacob Blanck, is on medals, jewels, fans and clothes; books, maps, the Elector of Saxony tried to dress like Louis XIV. exhibition at the Chateau of show in Paris at the prints and pictures; music and ballets; and, above They ordered their clothes, as well as other luxury Versailles, Le roi est mort (27 all, sculpture, fountains, gardens and buildings. goods, in Paris through special buyers they main- October-21 February). One Long after the overthrow of his monarchy, the tained there, in addition to their official diplomats. exhibit is a transcript of his palace and park he created at Versailles continue Aspects of Louis XIV’s patronage resembled that last words, framed to hang as a to act as an inexhaustible source of cultural of other royal collectors, including his father-in- warning by the bedside of his great-grandson and capital—and tourist revenue—for France. law, Philip IV of Spain. Like them, he accumulated Tsuccessor Louis XV: “I loved wars and buildings luxury objects such as jasper vases and agate cups, too much.” The Sun King knew that he had left Kilt of sun rays Classical cameos and antiquities, and pictures, France devastated, its finances in the state of The king was himself a work of art. Until the age of although even at the end of his reign he had fewer chaos that he had been determined to reform and 30 he repeatedly danced in court ballets, as spring than the King of Spain—about 1,500 to 2,000. its rivals much stronger than they had been at the or—dressed in a kilt of sun rays—Apollo, the leader However, Louis’s passion for medals distinguished start of his personal rule in 1661. of the muses and the god of the sun, which he him. He had antique and contemporary exam- Louis XIV did, however, succeed in his deter- took as his personal emblem. On great occasions ples—the latter often with laudatory inscriptions mination—as his finance minister, Jean-Baptiste his coat glittered with embroidery and jewels. such as Rex, Dux et Miles (king, leader and soldier) Colbert, told the great sculptor Bernini in 1665— The king’s personal jewel casket, densely covered or Nec Pluribus Impar (of many, none is his to spare nothing to make the arts flourish in gold filigree, made in Paris in 1676 by Jacob equal)—and commissioning, inspecting and rear- in France. Since the reign of Saint Louis Blanck from Nuremberg, is one of the treasures ranging them in special cases was one of his favour- in the 13th century the French monarchy, of the rooms of art from Louis XIV to Louis XVI, ite occupations. Medals boasting of Dutch power so reflecting its need to project power and which opened last year in the Louvre. maddened Louis XIV that they encouraged him to wealth, had outshone all others as a patron Louis also helped make Paris the fashion declare war on the Netherlands in 1672. of the arts (as the great exhibition at the capital of Europe. Partly to help the French But, as Louis admitted on his deathbed, build- Louvre in 2004, Paris 1400, confirmed). By dress industry, he used his mistress Madame de ings were his principal passion after war. In 1665, the multiplicity and intensity of his artistic Montespan, wearing a golden dress covered in Bernini was lured from Rome to redesign the passions—and the money at his disposal— point de France lace, as “a triumphant beauty palace of the Louvre for the king. Colbert, saying

Louis XIV raised this tradition to new levels to display to all the ambassadors”, in the words CONTINUED ON PAGE 56 MARÉCHALLE (LOUVRE)/STÉPHANE RMN-GP PARIS, COLLECTION. ROYAL © FORMER CHEST: GOLD IMAGES DEAGOSTINI/GETTY STATUE: 56 THE ART NEWSPAPER Number 271, September 2015

FEATURES Royal collections

victory. After 1680 the Place des Victoires and the LOUIS XIV: HIS MANIA Place Vendôme were built around statues of the king, which were also erected (and in most cases re-erected under Louis XVIII in the 19th century, FOR THE CULT OF SELF after their destruction by revolutionaries), accord- ing to an official programme in many other cities— CONTINUED FROM PAGE 55 Lyons, Dijon, Montpellier, Rennes and Quebec that Bernini knew nothing about the spaces for among them. Among the best known is the one guards, ministers and “persons of quality” neces- Bernini told still visible beside the high altar in Notre Dame. sary in a French palace, ensured that he was not No doubt in reaction to the humiliations he used. Indeed, there was much tension between the king that had suffered during the civil war of the Fronde the sculptor and members of the French court. for someone (1648-52), where he was forced to flee rebel armies, But the King liked Bernini, as he did his other and Paris itself, by night, and to dismiss his favour- favourites: premier Peintre Charles Le Brun, his who had ite chief minister, Cardinal Mazarin, Louis XIV chief gardener, André Le Nôtre, and his architect, not seen had a passion, even a mania, for self-commemora- Jules Hardouin-Mansart. Bernini told the king tion. This passion was expressed above all in the that for someone who had not seen Italy, he had Italy, he had gardens and , which he began remarkably good taste. Before he sculpted Louis, to transform in 1661. It was his personal project, for the bust now at Versailles, he scrutinised him remarkably pursued against the advice of Colbert, who for a long time, then ran his hands through the good taste preferred him to live in the Louvre. The king may king’s hair to make it look better. have been influenced by the magnificent houses In the end, instead of Bernini’s Roman built by two ministers: the Château de Richelieu , Louis XIV chose the monumental façade instigated by Cardinal Richelieu, now demolished, we see today for the Louvre’s east wing, decorated and Vaux-le-Vicomte by Nicolas Fouquet, Louis’s with a colonnade of coupled Corinthian columns, superintendent of finance. After Fouquet’s impris- designed by Perrault and D’Orbay and covered The Hall of Mirrors onment in 1661, the king took some of his best in Ls, crowns and sun-rays. The Louvre was both at Versailles glorifies sculptures and tapestries for Versailles. Other pos- a royal palace and—long before the opening of Louis’s political, sible models were the palace of Venaria Reale near a public museum in 1793—a palace of the arts. economic and artistic Turin, started by his first cousin, Duke Charles Some rooms were used to display antiquities or success. Below, Emmanuel of Savoy, in 1659 and Chambord and pictures from the royal collection, or an annual Charles Le Brun Fontainebleau, built by François I. the king organised there. As early as 14 October The Fountain of Apollo show of new paintings. Others accommodated depicts him making the Versailles, however, differed from other palaces 1663, wrote one guest, “every day balls, ballets, at Versailles archives, the Imprimerie Royale, artists and furni- decision to go to war by its size, by the number of surrounding satellite comedies, music for voices and instruments of ture-makers like André-Charles Boulle who made with the Dutch in 1672, houses such as Marly, Trianon and Clagny, by the every kind, violins, promenades, hunts and other the luxurious bronze and gilt marquetry furniture accompanied by Mars, luxury with which it was furnished and decorated; diversions have succeeded each other”. They would the king loved; and the academies of painting and Minerva and Justice and by the ceaseless round of “divertissements” not stop—except for a gap of seven years after sculpture, and inscriptions. Louis XIV’s death—until 1789. Colbert complained in 1665. “Ah, what a pity Military “cité idéale” that the greatest and most virtuous prince… The Hotel Royal des Invalides was even more should be judged by the measure of Versailles!” imposing than the Louvre. It was a military He feared that Le Nôtre and the architect of the “cité idéale”, two-and-a-half centuries before Le first phase of the expansion, Louis Le Vau, would Corbusier coined the phrase, on the south-west “drag your majesty from schemes to schemes to edge of Paris. Its 15 courtyards contained barracks, render their works immortal”. However, even from a monastery, a hospice, a bakery and factories, in distant battlefields, Louis personally supervised its addition to the church under its glorious dome. construction and decoration, demanding to know “His house at At the ceremony of inauguration in 1706, the king “every detail”. Charles Perrault of the Académie des Versailles is congratulated the architect Hardouin-Mansart. Inscriptions claimed that, whenever his architects Then, turning to his wife, the king said: “Madame, challenged his wishes, the king said “in a loud something the seeing you here, I cannot refrain from compli- voice and which appeared inflected with anger: do foolishest in menting you for the share that you must take in what you please, but if you destroy it, I will have it the glory that Monsieur your husband is receiving rebuilt as it is and without changing anything in it”. the world; he today.” As with the arts, women were more promi- is galloping nent at the court of France than at any other. “Spirit of youth everywhere” Louis XIV also added to Paris two triumphal The central room, the Galerie des Glaces, was over one’s arches celebrating his victories, the Portes Saint- not only the largest in Europe but its frescoes, Denis (1672) and Saint-Martin (1674), the latter by Charles Le Brun and his studio, glorified the head in showing the king as a naked Hercules, crowned by king alone—not, as other palaces did, dynastic every ceiling” DREAMWORKS IGAGS © FOUNTAIN: COUTO. DOMINIQUE RAUX/MONTAGE OJÉDA/FRANCK VERSAILLES)/RENÉ-GABRIEL DE (CHÂTEAU PALAIS RMN-GRAND © MIRRORS: OF HALL THE ART NEWSPAPER Number 271, September 2015 57

in the middle of winter and at the age of 70. Tuberoses, hyacinths and Rivals in splendour daff odils, which sometimes over- In The Age of Louis XIV (1751), Voltaire praised the king’s patronage powered courtiers with their scents, of culture and described his reign as “the most enlightened age there packed his parterres. As is evident has ever been”. How do the other great monarch-patrons of the 17th today, most of the garden consists century compare? of avenues in straight lines, deco- rated with fountains and the largest Charles I of England collection of statues in Europe. Like his medals, they linked the king to the (1600-49) Classical past: they showed Latona, Ceres A far superior collector of pictures than or Apollo, surrounded by muses or driving Louis; before its dispersal after his the chariot of the sun. There were also, however, execution, Charles’s gathering of paint- proto-Romantic gardens with winding paths and Medal (1672) designed ings—of great European painters of the wildernesses. The ultimate honour for visitors he by Jean Warin with Louis Renaissance and Baroque periods, and wanted to impress was a tour of the gardens as as the sun warming those by his court painter Van Dyck the fountains played. Many workmen and soldiers the earth. It bears one and distinguished visitor Rubens—may had died building aqueducts and diverting rivers of the king’s favourite have been the greatest of all royal col- to bring water to Versailles for those fountains. mottos: Nec Pluribus lections. But he could not compare with Impar (of many, none is Louis in terms of building. Increasing Palace of paper his equal) political strife prevented what might Versailles was a palace of paper as well as stone. have been his Versailles: the overhaul The literature it inspired included sermons by of Whitehall Palace by Inigo Jones, visible in Jones’s exquisite drawings of the court preacher Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet 1638. State-sponsored literature in the Caroline era was of mixed quality; denouncing the king’s mistresses. Thanks to the Anniversary events theatre, so prominent in previous decades, declined with Shakespeare dead king’s favour and courtiers’ love of mockery, and Ben Jonson marginalised, though Charles was an enthusiastic supporter Molière could be especially daring about class and Le roi est mort, Château of poets, particularly those who became known as the Cavalier poets. He religious hypocrisy in the plays he wrote to amuse de Versailles, 27 October-21 also instituted the post of Master of the King’s Music. The courtly masque them. Racine not only wrote plays for the court February was the de ning performing art of his reign, often with texts by Jonson and but also, as his historiographer, recorded Louis A programme of operas, stage and costume designs by Jones, but the music has not survived. ancestors or the gods of Olympus. From 1682 Ver- XIV’s campaigns. The fl ood of memoirs, epigrams, concerts and other events sailles replaced Saint-Germain-en-Laye as Louis’s letters written at court (none more scathing than accompanies the exhibition, principal residence—although he continued to the correspondence of the king’s German sister-in- www.chateauversailles-spec- Philip IV of Spain use other royal chateaux, such as Compiègne law, Elizabeth Charlotte) serves as a counterblast tacles.fr (1605-65) or Fontainebleau, and much of the royal family, to the narrative of events in offi cial propaganda, Another supreme collector of pictures, household and government remained in Paris. It as well as an education in psychology. A Kingdom of Images: the Planet King’s holdings, based on continued to expand until the end of his reign. In Louis XIV made Versailles a cultural force com- French Prints in the Age the already extraordinary collection of 1699, creating new rooms for his granddaughter, parable to Renaissance Florence or Golden-Age of Louis XIV 1660-1715, his grandfather Philip II, may have num- the Duchesse de Bourgogne, Louis XIV said: “There Weimar. Today, thanks to brilliant staff and gen- Getty Center, Los Angeles, until bered around 4,000 paintings by the must be a spirit of youth everywhere.” By then, it erous funding, Versailles is in a better state than 6 September, travels as Images time he died. He had help in building was the most celebrated palace in Europe. at any time since the court’s abrupt departure on du grand siècle: l’estampe this collection from the not inconsid- As well as a royal residence, Versailles was a 6 October 1789. The Centre de Musique Baroque française sous Louis XIV, erable eye of one Diego Velázquez, his hunting lodge, a permanent music and dance fi lls the palace with music; the Académie du Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, court painter but also curator of the festival, a fashion parade, a fi nishing school and a Spectacle Équestre brings horses to the courtyards 2 November–31 January 2016, Royal Collection, who travelled to Italy military and government headquarters. Books of and gardens; the Research Centre consistently www.getty.edu on Philip’s behalf for almost three years engravings, published by the royal press, brought publishes new work on the court, including a bio- to acquire sculpture and paintings for views of Versailles to the courts of Europe. Other graphical database for its entire personnel. Every Triumph and Disaster: the Hall of Mirrors, a vast gallery in the monarchs, from Peter the Great in Russia to João year, fi ve million people visit the palace. Medals of the Sun King, Buen Retiro palace. The Buen Retiro V in Portugal, built similar palaces and pavilions. Three hundred years after his death, Louis XIV British Museum, until 15 only survives in fragments: part of the But there were critical voices. The English diplo- lives on. November, Prado is one of two parts of the building mat Matthew Prior wrote: “His house at Versailles • Philip Mansel is writing a biography of Louis XIV. www.britishmuseum.org that remain, while its gardens are the is something the foolishest in the world; he is strut- Previous books include a life of Louis XVIII; Dressed to basis of Madrid’s Retiro park. It was a ting in every panel and galloping over one’s head in Rule, a study of court dress from Louis XIV to Elizabeth II; La vie quotidienne à grand palace in its time yet hastily and poorly built, partly through cost-cut- every ceiling.” But Prior’s master, William III, would and The Eagle in Splendour: Inside the Court of , Maisons au temps de Louis ting as Philip’s reign grew increasingly impoverished. Philip had a passion for also be glorifi ed in prints and medals, portraits and reissued this year with a new introduction. He is a XIV, Château de Maisons, Mai- literature and helped stimulate Spanish Golden Age theatre in his support of frescoes—partly in competition with Louis. member of the committee of the Centre de Recherche du sons-La tte, France, until Lope de Vega and Pedro Calderón de la Barca, among others. The poet Fran- Louis XIV loved his gardens as much as his Château de Versailles and editor of The Court Historian, 30 October, www.maisons. cisco de Quevedo, one of the two great poets of the Golden Age alongside

MEDAL: © THE TRUSTEES OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM. CHARLES I, PHILIP IV: © THE NATIONAL GALLERY, LONDON GALLERY, NATIONAL THE © IV: PHILIP I, CHARLES MUSEUM. BRITISH THE OF TRUSTEES THE © MEDAL: palaces,Reuben inspecting Nakian Ad_10.24x5.41_8-11-15 them almost every day, evenv2_Layout 1the 8/11/15 international 12:08 journal PM of Page the Society 1 for Court Studies monuments-nationaux.fr his rival Luis de Góngora, was an important gure in Philip’s court. B.L.

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