Part 20

The picture was much talked of in its day at Versailles; in the _boudoirs_; at the toilet of the marquise; and at the _petits soupers_ of the King, Louis XV. Many poets have sung its praises. One of the latest and best tributes is by Roger Milès called a _Madrigal for a Portrait of the Marquise de Baglion painted by Nattier_. In reading it we cannot help regretting that the beautiful Flora could not have read these sympathetic verses:

_MADRIGAL_

(_Pour un Portrait de la Marquise de Baglion peint par Nattier_)

_Dès le matin, dans la rosée, au fond du parc, La Marquise s’en fut, pour saluer l’Aurore, Et les cerfs inquiets qui sommeillaient encore, Pour Diane la prenant, des yeux cherchaient son arc._

_Mais elle n’était pas la Déesse farouche Et, si parfois ses yeux ont pu lancer ces traits, Ses victimes devaient y trouver des attraits, Tant le sourire avait de douceur sur sa bouche._

_Elle allait simplement, fière de sa beauté, Humilier les fleurs écloses pour lui plaire, Sachant leur jalousie aimable et sans colère, Ames où des parfums chantent la volupté._

_Et voici que ses mains cruelles et câlines Ont fait leur choix parmi la fraicheur des buissons, Pour les encourager, de leurs nids, les pinsons Raillaient à plein gosier les branches orphelines._

_Et de ses belles mains déborde son butin. Sa cueillette fut bonne, et ses touffes fleuries. Suffiraient à parer la mousse des prairies Quant la Nature dit sa prière au Matin._

_Sur un banc, souriante, elle s’est reposée, Une rose retient l’épaulette qui fuit, Et le Zephyr qui passe en balayant la nuit, S’attarde à la splendour de sa gorge rosée._

_L’étoffe la possède entre ses plis légers, Des joyaux précieux se serrent à sa hanche, Et, sur un chiffonné de mousseline blanche, Ses genoux par un tissu bleu sont assiégés._

_Mais un charme divin s’epanouait en elle, Et l’on tremble, en voyant son pur rayonnement, Que Dieu pour nous ravir à cet enchantement, Ne fasse palpiter à son épaule ... une aile._

LA CAMARGO.

_Nicolas Lancret_ (_1690–1743_).

_Collection of the Hon. Andrew W. Mellon._

This painting came into this country directly from the Collection of the Emperor of Germany, having long hung in Potsdam Palace, “Sans Souci,” near Berlin. It was originally in the Collection of the Prince de Carignan in Paris, from whom it was acquired in 1744 by the Count von Rothenburg, Prussian Ambassador, for Frederick the Great (1712–1786), to adorn his castle at Rheinsberg.

The picture is in oils on canvas (30 × 41¾ inches). We have here a typical scene of French Eighteenth Century life, laid in a beautiful park of emerald swards, lovely trees, and graceful foliage, a “terminal” figure of a Muse in the middle distance, and a fountain tossing its spray at the extreme right. Mademoiselle Camargo and her partner occupy the left centre of the picture dancing to music played by a small orchestra on the left. Seated and standing around them beneath the trees are groups of interested spectators; and among them at the extreme left Lancret has painted his own portrait. He is wearing a dark mantle and a _biretta_, and looks directly toward the observer.

The dancer, who gives the name to the picture, is the celebrated Marie Anne de Cuppi de Camargo, born in Brussels in 1710. The Princess de Ligne became interested in her and sent her to Paris at the age of ten to be trained for a dancer. Under Madame Prevost, a dancer at the Opéra, her progress was so rapid that she made her _début_ at the Opéra at the age of seventeen, when her extraordinary grace and her wonderful clothes caused her to be acclaimed as a star. Through the lessons of Blondy and Dupré she perfected her talents and became the most famous Parisian dancer of her time. A _liaison_ with the Comte de Clermonte Abbé of Saint-Germain-des-Prés caused her to leave the Opéra in 1734; but she returned in 1740 and regained her former triumphs. This was the time when Lancret painted some wonderful portraits of the great _danseuse_, including the fine picture presented here. Mademoiselle Camargo retired permanently in 1751 and died in Paris in 1770.

[Illustration:

_Collection of the Hon. Andrew J. Mellon_

LA CARMARGO

--_Nicolas Lancret_]

Nicolas Lancret was born in Paris in 1690 and died there in 1743. He was a pupil of Pierre d’Ulin and Claude Gillot; but he adopted Watteau as his model. Indeed, his close imitations of Watteau estranged the latter. Lancret, however, won a great reputation for his beautiful sense of composition, his fine design, and his charming color. He was elected a member of the French Academy of Painting in 1719. His landscapes are always delicate and romantic, and as a painter of _Fêtes galantes_ he almost equals Watteau and Pater.

LE DUO.

_Nicolas Lancret (1690–1743)._

_Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Emil J. Stehli._

At first glance we might take this painting for a Watteau, for Lancret has shown in it the same appreciation of park scenery, leafy and fresh foliage, charming figures of grace and refinement, and, even more particularly, the suggestion of music. We seem to hear the liquid, silvery, cool notes of the flute and the sweet, clear voice of the pretty young lady who is singing from a book of music while the young gallant looks over her shoulder and plays his part in the duet. The costumes are lovely; the young lady is dressed in white and the flute-player wears a brownish-red suit. The flute-player’s pose is interesting: all his weight is placed on his right foot. Note his hands: they are properly placed on the holes of his instrument, which he is holding as a musician. The French have always been superlative flute-players and it was only natural that Lancret would select a capable musician for his model. We can make a safe guess that the music we are hearing from these musicians is an air by Rameau, whose operas and ballets were enjoying great vogue when this picture was painted. The work, oils on canvas (19¾ × 16¾ inches), belonged to the Collection of Sir William Knighton, Bart., and came from that of Mr. Pitt Rivers of London to the present owner, Mr. Emil J. Stehli of New York.

Comparing Lancret with Watteau, Eugène Langevin writes:

“First the style of the master was not adopted by him in its entirety; he modified it in accordance with his own disposition; he has played some of Watteau’s melodies, but in a lower key and with a slower movement. It is _conversations galantes_ rather than _fêtes galantes_ that he paints. He seems to feel that he does not possess the fire, the caprice, the vivacity, the imagination, and the supreme poetic distinction that are required for _Departures for the Enchanted Isle_. He halts half-way. Where Watteau painted sumptuous and impassioned eclogues, Lancret portrays rural amusements, richly adorned and at the same time frolicsome as he had seen them on the boards. Watteau revels in the most magical of fictions: he is the Shakespeare, the Aristophanes of Art.

[Illustration:

_Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Emil J. Stehli_

LE DUO

--_Nicolas Lancret_]

“Like Watteau, Lancret broke with the academic traditions of the day, which were all for reddish or brown tints: he acknowledged a wholesome horror of burnt colors. And if he lacks that distinction which his master owed to his constant practice of Flemish and Venetian Art and to his own natural gifts, if he cannot produce those glowing and _rutilant_ tonalities full of golden sheen, those rich colors, and those subtle harmonies of infinitely delicate beauty, he, at least, possessed a palette both rich and refined.”

UNE FÊTE CHAMPÊTRE.

_Jean Baptiste Joseph Pater (1695–1736)._

_Collection of Mr. Jules S. Bache._

This brilliant picture, painted in 1733, the height of the Regency period, came from the Collection of Lady Carnarvon, having been bequeathed to her by Alfred Charles de Rothschild of Seymour Place, London.

The scene is laid in a romantic landscape with the ruins of an old _château_ and other ancient buildings surrounded by beautiful, feathery trees. Upon the green sward groups of men, women, and children have gathered to enjoy themselves in various ways. The merry assemblage, dressed in brilliant costumes of delightful colors, charmingly harmonized and contrasted, are dancing, feasting, making love, and watching actors and mountebanks perform. Even two little dogs in the foreground have partaken of the general gaiety. The movement, _brio_ and general _joie de vivre_ make this a veritable panorama of the Eighteenth Century. The picture is also noteworthy for being the largest ever painted by Pater.

[Illustration:

_Collection of Mr. Jules S. Bache_

UNE FÊTE CHAMPÊTRE

--_J. B. J. Pater_]

Jean Baptiste Joseph Pater was born at Valenciennes in 1695, the son of a wood-carver who appreciated his son’s talent, taught him what he could, and then took him to Paris, where he became a pupil of his fellow-townsman, Watteau. The irritable temper of Watteau caused a separation; but in 1721 Watteau sent for Pater to come to him at Nogent-sur-Marne and gave him daily instruction.

Pater was very “modernistic” in his time, for in 1728 he was received into the Academy as a member of the new class of “_peintres de sujets modernes_.”

Pater was entirely absorbed in his art. He rarely left his studio, formed no friendships, painted all day and every day, and gave himself no pleasures. His feverish industry coupled with his parsimonious living--he was haunted by the fear of poverty in old age--at last told upon him and he died in Paris in 1736.

Pater is a very close follower of Watteau in subject and composition as well as in his charming and delicate color.

UNE FÊTE GALANTE.

_Jean Baptiste Joseph Pater (1695–1736)._

_Collection of Mr. Edward J. Berwind._

It is interesting to compare this picture with the _Fête Champêtre_ preceding it. We have two characteristic examples of Pater’s work. In the _Fête Champêtre_ we look upon a large gathering and a miscellaneous crowd. In the picture represented here we have a more intimate group. There are certain elements in this picture that suggest Watteau; others that suggest Lancret; and still others that show us that the later Boucher and Fragonard did not deign to take a few ideas from Pater. The picture is very individual. The colors are soft and delicate--“pastel” tints we like to call them to-day--pale blues, and pinks, and yellows, and rich mauves, contrasting beautifully with the exquisite green of the foliage. Pater never produced a more artistic background, with its distant hills and picturesque buildings. The painting came from the Wertheimer Collection, London, to the present owner.

[Illustration:

_Collection of Mr. Edward J. Berwind_

UNE FÊTE GALANTE

--_J. B. J. Pater_]

LA SERINETTE.

_Jean Baptiste Siméon Chardin (1699–1779)._

_Collection of the late Mr. Henry Clay Frick._

Madame de Pompadour, whose taste in art was always superlatively good, was the first owner of this charming picture, which has passed through many notable collections. The work is known under three titles: _La Serinette_ (the Bird-Organ); the _Education of a Canary_; and _The Diversions of a Lady_. According to tradition this lady is Madame Chardin, wife of the painter. The sitting-room gives us an idea of her varied occupations and it would appear that she has just left her tapestry-work to give her canary a singing-lesson. The bird is seen in a cage, which stands on a little table near the window, and Madame Chardin is turning the handle of the bird-organ. We would like to know the tune the little music-box produces. Both as regards subject and treatment the picture is a masterpiece. Jean Guiffrey considers the work most charming and admires the way all the many accessories are brought into perfect harmony. “It would be impossible to find,” he says, “a more correct design and a better color scheme and tonality.”

Chardin sent this picture to the Salon of 1751 and again to that of 1755. After Madame de Pompadour’s death _La Serinette_ passed into the notable Collections of Monsieur de Vandières, director of the Royal Buildings; the Marquis de Menars, Madame de Pompadour’s brother (sold in 1783); Baron Denon, Director of Museums (sale 1826); Count d’Houdetot (sale 1859); Duke de Morny (sale 1865); Mr. G. du Tillet of Paris; and, finally, to the late Mr. Henry Clay Frick.

The picture was shown in 1860 at the Exposition of the Association for the Mutual Relief of Artists, Painters, Sculptors, and Architects (No. 92).

Chardin was one of the greatest colorists of the French School and one of the greatest painters of the Eighteenth Century. Few painters have equalled him in his broad and free style and in his luminous effects of color and light.

[Illustration:

_Collection of the late Mr. Henry Clay Frick_

LA SERINETTE

--_J. B. S. Chardin_]

Chardin was born in Paris, Nov. 2, 1699, the son of a master-carpenter and upholsterer, who was employed to make billiard-tables for Louis XIV. After studying under Pierre Jacques Cazes, Chardin entered the studio of Noël Nicolas Coypel. Before he was thirty he had made a name as a painter of still-life. In 1728 Chardin was admitted to the Académie Royale and eventually became its treasurer. In 1752 Louis XV bestowed a pension upon him and in 1757 gave him rooms in the Louvre. In his middle period Chardin struck out in a new path--that of frank realism, selecting for subjects scenes from the domestic life of the _bourgeoisie_; but he treats everything, however, with the distinction and taste that belonged to France in the Eighteenth Century. Therefore, he throws a poetic glamour around a loaf of bread, a bunch of grapes, a plate of peaches, a sleeping cat, or a copper _casserole_. Consequently, while his subjects are similar to those of the “Little Dutch Masters,” Chardin introduces an elegance and a quality of which those painters never dreamed. Neither Pieter de Hoogh, nor Vermeer, excelled Chardin in effects of light, atmosphere, and iridescence. “Chardin,” Élie Faure writes, “did not paint much because he paints slowly with a laborious and passionate application. He has no models, but his wife, children, a few familiar animals, the everyday tableware, and cooking-utensils and then there are meat, vegetables, bread, and wine brought that same day from the butcher, the meat-roaster, the baker, and the vegetable seller. With these he writes the legend of domestic labor and of obscure life: his images speak to us after the manner of La Fontaine’s words and he is, with Watteau and Goya, the greatest painter there is in Europe between the death of Rembrandt and the maturity of Corot and of Delacroix.”

Chardin is an artist beloved by artists. In a sympathetic criticism, Armand-Dayot writes:

“It is not by accident that I am using this word _métier: beauté du métier_--all is comprised in that phrase. By this phrase the greater number of the French artists of the Eighteenth Century should be judged. _La beauté du métier_--that expresses all their efforts. And, indeed, what formula could better define Chardin than the _beauté du métier_? An illumination, meticulous and systematic, because it has been so well ordered and arranged; light departing from one point to appear at another and showing the various objects according to the place they occupy with relation to the distance from the luminous centre; a beautiful paste of the best composition in its own day and which time has converted into a transparent and limpid enamel; and, above all, that classical arrangement, which is like that of Poussin, Le Brun, Le Sueur and Claude Lorrain, add to the play of great sweeps of color; the enchanting reflections that cross one another and that are superimposed without breaking the original balance of the contrasting colors; and the rigorous drawing--such are the reasons why we class Chardin high in the French traditions of clarity and beautiful arrangement of light. In his richness of color he is derived from the Venetians and he became the ancestor of Fantin-Latour.”

Chardin’s vogue is increasing day by day, for he belongs to that small group of great masters who have played with light. Perhaps, more than any other painter, Chardin succeeded in producing the most subtle overtones of color. M. Armand-Dayot, as we have just seen, claims Chardin as the ancestor of Fantin-Latour. May we not also suggest that in Chardin, Matisse has found inspiration for his delicate and tenuous effects in the upper reaches of the color scale?

We get a glimpse of Chardin at work from Diderot who, after a visit to his _atelier_, wrote:

“Chardin, who has such a keen feeling for color, keeps his eyes glued upon his canvas: his mouth is half-open; and he breathes heavily. His palette is a picture of chaos and into this chaos he dips his brush. From it he draws his work of real creation,--birds with all the delicate _nuances_ of tint in their plumage; flowers with velvet petals; trees of varied foliage and greenery, the blue of the sky, the spray of water, animals with their soft fur and the fire flaming from their brilliant eyes. The painter rises, walks some distance away, and throws a rapid glance upon his picture; then he seats himself again before this canvas and you soon see appear flesh tints, cloth, velvet, damask, taffetas, transparent muslin, or heavy linen. You also see the ripe yellow pear falling from the tree and the green grapes hanging on the vine.”

LES DEUX CONFIDENTES.

_François Boucher (1703–1770)._

_Collection of Mrs. William R. Timken._

Madame de Pompadour was the first owner of this picture and it looks as if it might have been painted at her suggestion. It is signed and dated 1750 and measures 32 × 29 inches,--a perfect size for a boudoir or a small _salon_. Next the picture was in the Collections of Pillet-Will, the Marquis de Marigny, and the Marquis de Menars.

Here we have two young ladies of high degree playing at pastoral life. Their bare feet and the presence of sheep are the only suggestion that they are shepherdesses. They are, however, shepherdesses of the kind we read of in the eclogues of poets.

In every way the picture is charming. The composition is faultless, the lights splendidly concentrated and diffused, and the colors are of exquisite beauty. Against the green of the feathery trees in the background and the verdant turf in the foreground the lustrous silken dresses--palest blue and palest rose--of the young ladies who are exchanging confidences (doubtless of faithful or faithless lovers) appear to the greatest advantage. The flowers, tumbling out of the basket which has fallen down, are most sympathetically painted by one who rarely, if ever, omitted roses in any picture. All the colors melt and mingle in perfect harmony.

Boucher painted at the height of the Louis XV period and of this period Élie Faure says:

“François Boucher is its soul. Fashion is always present in his facile and fecund work--on ceilings, screens, carriage-panels, _dessous portes_, boxes and fans--shepherdesses and pastorales everywhere and on every thing. Charming in manner, generous, pleasure-loving and adored by both men and women, Boucher stands with the King’s mistress, Madame de Pompadour, as the centre of his own revolving circle of winged Cupids and garlands of flowers.”

[Illustration:

_Collection of Mrs. William R. Timken_

LES DEUX CONFIDENTES

--_François Boucher_]

François Boucher, born in Paris, Sept. 29, 1703, began his career as an illustrator and engraver and went to Italy with Carle Van Loo. Returning to Paris in 1731 he frequented the gay society of operatic and theatrical circles and acquired reputation. In 1734 he was admitted to the Academy with his picture of _Rinaldo and Armida_ now in the Louvre. Boucher became associated with the tapestry-manufactory at Beauvais and also at the Gobelins and in 1765 succeeded Carle Van Loo as first painter to Louis XV. Boucher attracted the attention of Madame de Pompadour and decorated her boudoirs and _salons_, and painted several portraits of this handsome lady. Boucher died in the Louvre in 1770, while painting _Venus at her Toilet_. According to his own record Boucher painted a thousand pictures and made ten thousand drawings and sketches.

A YOUNG GIRL READING A LETTER.

_Jean Baptiste Greuze (1725–1805)._

_Collection of Mr. John McCormack._

This picture, an oil painting on canvas (27½ × 21½ inches), comes from the Collection of Alfred Charles de Rothschild, Seamore Place, London, and represents a young girl seated in an upholstered chair wearing a white chemise, which has slipped from her shoulders. An open letter is spread on her lap,--a letter before envelopes were known, for this has the seal still attached. However, letters bring tidings of delight or sorrow, with or without envelopes, and we have no clue to the contents of this one. We gather, however, that the missive is a love-letter.

[Illustration:

_Collection of Mr. John McCormack_

A YOUNG GIRL READING A LETTER

--_Jean Baptiste Greuze_]

Jean Baptiste Greuze was born at Tournous, near Macon, Burgundy, and was the son of a thatcher. He first studied painting with a travelling picture-pedlar named Grondon and went with him to Lyons and lived there for eight years, painting pictures and hawking them about the country. However, Grondon was the father of the wife of Grétry, the composer, so Greuze probably had a little taste of art. In 1746 he went to Paris and worked at the Academy, making some progress in historical painting and portraits. One day he astonished everybody by his picture of _Un père de famille expliquant la Bible à ses enfants_ and _Le Paralytique servi par ses enfants_, which caused him to be received as an _Académicien_. Others of this type of pathetic, or homely, story-telling in paint followed. This, then new style of art, won Greuze many admirers, among them Diderot. In 1756 Greuze went to Rome for two years and on his return to Paris began to exhibit his now famous busts and heads of beautiful young girls. Between 1755 and 1769 Greuze exhibited about one hundred and twenty pictures at the Louvre and, after the Revolution, about thirty works. He was entirely broken by the Revolution and died in 1805 in poverty and oblivion.

YOUNG GIRL.

_Jean Baptiste Greuze (1725–1805)._

_Collection of Mr. William Randolph Hearst._

We hardly know which face to admire the most--that of the little girl or that of her little dog with the bright, intelligent eyes, so loving and so trustful.

[Illustration:

_Collection of Mr. William Randolph Hearst_

YOUNG GIRL

--_Jean Baptiste Greuze_]

This picture (14 × 14 inches) Greuze has painted with the tenderest care,--depicting the budding beauty of the child; and he has, moreover, used the swirling curves in such a distinguished manner that we think of the circles and the curves in Raphael’s _Madonna della Sedia_ in the Pitti. There is a gentle sadness in the face of the little girl of which the little companion and friend, so confidently nestled in her loving arms, seems to be conscious; and, perhaps, a little worried as well.

LA MARQUISE DE BESONS TUNING A GUITAR

_Jean Baptiste Greuze (1725–1805)._

_Collection of Dr. and Mrs. Henry Barton Jacobs._

At the Salon of 1757 Greuze exhibited this portrait under the title of _Madame X Tuning a Guitar_. Many who saw the picture recognized Madame X as Anne de Bricqueville de la Luzerne, wife of Jacques Bazin, Marquis de Besons, a very prominent and powerful lord of the Houses of Hupin, Neuvill, etc., and Lieutenant-General of the King’s armies.