LOUIS- AUGUSTE BRUN, PEINTRE DE MARIE- ANTOINETTE 4.03. – 10.07.2016 www.brun.chateaudeprangins.ch AVEC LA PARTICIPATION DE LA FONDATION GOBLET Musée national suisse | Château de Prangins CH – 1197 Prangins | T. +41 (0)58 469 38 90 www.chateaudeprangins.ch | Ma – Di 10.00 – 17.00 Portrait équestre de Marie-Antoinette (1783) ,© Musée national des châteaux de Versailles et de Trianon © Bridgeman Images, Paris Press Pack Contents 1. Press release 2. The exhibition a. Texts of the exhibition rooms b. Visuals of principal exhibits c. Foreword to the catalogue d. Louis-Auguste Brun : chronology 3. Accompanying the exhibition a. Families and younger visitors: children’s questions b. “Rose water, eau de Cologne and perfumed gloves” c. Special day and final exhibition day 4. About Château de Prangins 5. Practical information and contacts 1 1. Press release Louis-Auguste Brun, Painter to Marie-Antoinette. From Prangins to Versailles (4.03.-10.07.2016) From 4 March to 10 July 2016, the Swiss National Museum – Château de Prangins presents an exhibition devoted to the remarkable career of Louis-Auguste Brun, a painter from the Geneva school best known for his equestrian portraits of Queen Marie-Antoinette. Some one hundred works, together with a film recounting the surprising last years of his life as both art dealer and Vaud patriot, allow visitors to explore the life of an individual who defies easy classification. With scent-based guided tours and a Marie-Antoinette-inspired menu at the Café du Château, it’s an experience for all the senses. A skilled draughtsman and an outstanding painter of portraits, animals and landscapes, the Swiss artist Louis-Auguste Brun (1758-1815) is today principally known for the works he produced at the French court, in particular two equestrian portraits of Marie-Antoinette. In fact, however, there is much more to his oeuvre. How did a young painter from the village of Rolle who completed his apprenticeship with a local craftsman come to enjoy the splendours of Versailles and gain an introduction to the Queen herself? The exhibition retraces his remarkable story in around a hundred oil paintings and drawings. It highlights the decisive role of Brun’s encounters in the early stages of his career at Château de Prangins, a centre of cultural life in the Vaud region. The rest is down to Brun’s talent as an artist. Entirely at his ease depicting the diversions and carefree life of the privileged class, Brun begins producing large numbers of portraits, landscapes, hunting and horse racing scenes from the time he arrives in Paris. The exhibition also presents the works created on the shores of Lake Geneva after his return from France. It ends with a film recounting the surprising final years of his life, as an art dealer, collector and Vaud patriot. Exhibition curators: Martine Hart and Helen Bieri Thomson 2 2. The exhibition 2.1 Texts of the exhibition rooms Early life and education 1758 – 1775 Born in Rolle in 1758, Louis-Auguste Brun comes from a family of craftsmen: his forefathers are architects and he starts out working with his father, who is a furniture maker. At the age of twelve, he embarks on an apprenticeship under the painter Jean Antoine Brun (who is not related to him). Descended from a line of painters and craftsmen, Jean Antoine Brun has specialised in landscape painting, producing decorative works for the grand residences of the region. One of his associates is Jacques Sablet the younger, who will become a painter of great renown. Sablet is charged with teaching architecture and perspective to the young Louis-Auguste. Louis-Auguste Brun, who moves to Geneva in 1776, is taken under the wing of the great collector François Tronchin. He also trains with his new friend, Pierre-Louis de la Rive. De la Rive, who is older than Brun, has been strongly influenced by the teachings of Nicolas-Henri-Joseph de Fassin, known as Chevalier Fassin, in Geneva. Originally from Liège, Fassin encouraged his pupils to copy the Dutch masters of the 17th century, such as Nicolas Berchem and Philips Wouwerman. At de la Rive’s prompting, Brun decides to do likewise. Prangins, the beginnings of a career 1775 – 1780 The year 1775 sees a decisive event in Brun’s artistic career: he presents himself at Château de Prangins and requests permission to copy the paintings from the collection of Louis-François Guiguer. At the time, Prangins is a hub of social and cultural life in the Lake Geneva region. Here, Brun meets numerous painters, including the young Pierre-Louis de la Rive, who advises him to move to Geneva in order to continue his training. At the Guiguers’, he also encounters members of the nobility who will exert a lasting influence on his career. 3 Arrival in Paris and first successes at the court 1781-1783 Apparently thanks to Lord Mount Stuart, an acquaintance of the Baron of Prangins, Brun obtains an introduction to Victor Amadeus III, King of Piedmont-Sardinia. After a brief period in Turin, he travels to Paris in 1781. He has the good fortune to find work swiftly, first for the Duke of Luynes and then for the royal family, probably assisted by the recommendations of Victor Amadeus III. Indeed, there were close ties between the royal families of Piedmont and France resulting from a series of marriages: three of Victor Amadeus’s children marry the brothers and sister of Louis XVI. These matrimonial arrangements gave rise to numerous exchanges of portraits. Marie-Antoinette Louis-Auguste Brun is principally known for his two equestrian portraits of Marie- Antoinette. The biographical information presented here tells the remarkable story of France’s most famous queen and provides a context for the two works by Brun, which date from 1783. This watershed year marks the end of a period of relative carefreeness for the sovereign, who can congratulate herself on having finally given France an heir to the throne. Yet it is also the start of a decade of misfortune: the Queen moves rapidly from unpopularity to being the object of fierce hatred which will end on the scaffold in 1793. Royal leisure pursuits : Hunting and equestrian sports 1782-1789 Louis-Auguste Brun is particularly adept at capturing the diversions, insouciance and frivolity of the privileged class, and so comes to paint the outdoor pursuits of the aristocracy in the dying days of the Ancien Régime. One of the King and his courtiers’ favourite activities is hunting: a field in which Brun, with his penchant for hunting scenes, comes to specialise. He is also an enthusiastic follower of horse racing, a new sport imported from England, which flourishes in France during the reign of Louis XVI. 4 Celebrating the landscape - Around Lake Geneva 1786-1800 Throughout his time in Paris and Versailles, Brun never forgets the region of his birth. Between 1781 and 1789, he takes the opportunity of several trips to Switzerland to execute commissions. Then comes the Revolution, a period of turmoil in Paris but also in Geneva and the Vaud region. In 1792, the painter acquires a property at Versoix. Brun’s preferred genres during the last part of his career are landscapes and hunting scenes as well as portraits. At the turn of the century, he gives up painting to devote himself to politics, and to his activities as an art dealer and collector. Brun, the Vaud patriot Although attached to the French royal family, Brun is known for his liberal ideas. Shortly after marrying for the second time in 1795, he becomes involved in revolutionary activism with his childhood friend Frédéric-César de La Harpe. Together, the two men will work to liberate the Vaud region from Bernese rule. From Paris, de La Harpe sends instructions, tracts and petitions to Versoix, which is in French territory at the time. Brun is tasked with forwarding them to their intended recipients. Travelling around the Vaud countryside with his painter’s paraphernalia, he does not arouse the suspicions of the Bernese authorities. However, Brun’s political engagement is not reflected in his art, and his favoured subjects remain landscapes and hunting scenes. Cabinet of Drawings - The perfect line Brun was first and foremost an outstanding and prolific draughtsman, and his oil paintings are, accordingly, relatively few in number. He was remarkably skilled at capturing the character of a person or the movement of an animal through the use of line. Myriad drawings attest to his involvement with the royal family and served as studies for paintings executed at Versailles. A number of sketches record journeys, towns and countrysides through which he travelled. Unsurprisingly, his favourite subjects include portraits, landscapes, horses and dogs. 5 2.2 Visuals of principal exhibits Full media documentation and a selection of photographs are available for download from the “Media” section of the website www.chateaudeprangins.ch. Louis-Auguste Brun. Portrait of Marie-Antoinette on Horseback, 1783. Oil on canvas, 59 x 64.5 cm. Musée national des châteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, Versailles. © Bridgeman Images, Paris Marie-Antoinette and Louis XVI Hunting with Hounds, 1783. Oil on canvas, 100 x 81.5 cm. Versailles, Musée national des châteaux de Versailles et de Trianon. © Château de Versailles, RMN-Grand Palais. Photograph by Christophe Fouin Study of a woman mounting her horse side-saddle, around 1782. Black chalk, brush and Indian ink, white gouache highlights on bluish paper, 30.7 x 25.2 cm. Collection des Musées d’art et d’histoire de la Ville de Genève, Cabinet d’arts graphiques, Collection de la Société des Arts de Genève. © Cabinet d’arts graphiques des Musées d’art et d’histoire, Genève, Collection de la Société des Arts de Genève.