Transcription
Hello everyone, welcome on Narcotic. Here is Nicola, and today we are tackling some very heavy stuff, so you'd better pay attention. I'm gonna be the apostle of a French pictorial pride, "The Bolt" by Jean Honoré Fragonard.
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We are in 1777. Jean Honoré Fragonard is 45 years old. He is already a famous painter who opposes the consecration of his art, of his research as an artist, of what he likes to do, like a testimony of his time. Here, with "The Bolt," it is now on canvas, 74 centimeters wide, 94 centimeters wide, and educated. So, in 1777, and conserved in Paris at the Louvre Museum.
There are a lot of issues that arise when we study this painting. A lot has been written and separated, even over-interpreted. What we are going to do is to travel into the painting. Remember that a painter, like any artist, is sometimes forced to resort to artifice to hide his message. That's why we are going to progress from the most obvious to the most hidden, and without further ado.
So, what do you see? Do not try to interpret immediately. Love scene? Rape scene? You have to abandon all your prejudices to investigate. So, what do you see? Two characters, knighted in an embrace. The woman, the man who stretches out his arm to close the bolt that gives the painting its title, and who is finally one of the actors of the drama, of the action. This room, the scaffold, is seen. This destiny is locked. Madame, meanwhile, tries to free herself from this unstable extension where the postures of the two characters meet. A love, closed eyes, pink cheeks. She puts her hand on the libertine's neck, but her further hone to the libertine. The salt.
See the distribution in space: one-third of the painting for the couple, and two-thirds for the bed. Keep all of these pieces in your mind, and in the end, you will be able to rebuild and parvis illusive. The use of colors and lights form the harmony that the atmosphere of the painting finally unites. Is that the palette is reduced to three colors and their shades: the color red, silver, white, and yellow golden, and its shades of brown. The light is felt here as a substance because it catches all the folds of the drapes, and even the absence of light, the shadow. We can say that the shadows are hanging on the drapery, for example, on the canopy, for on the table.
The light also builds the painting. We can follow its trajectory from the lock, and it goes down, passing to the couple in full light. So, it aligns them. It's almost like a spotlight. Then it goes through the corner of the bed to stop on the table, and on the abel. This effect underlines the diagonal that cuts the painting into. From there, you can already see that the color, the distribution of space, the light, and the constriction are to collect the wall in a complex way. There is a true reflection, and this complexity of the construction is only an echo of the iconographic complexity.
And we are interesting now in all this iconography, remembering that the codes of painting are known to all artists and art lovers on the a matters from the 18th century, and of course, the sponsor of this painting, the Marquis de Vaudreuil. And so, there is no over-interpretation of myself.
So, we start with this small bucket of wildflowers at the bottom, white. This kind of bucket, one of the neckline by woman, and which adds an aesthetic function, of course, as well as a perfume. And at this moment, we must remember the lines of Consul versus plug, Fleur Curie, off as with this flower, old age to tarnish the beauty. We continue and pass by the overturned chair, which highlights the violent aspect of the scene. The apple on the table, the arrival point of light. It is the fruits of sin, Eve's apple, which here is his wall. It hasn't been chewed yet. Then the jug. We will think of the painting of a good friend of Fragonard, Chardin, who in 1771 painted "The Broken Jug" with the same iconography and the same message. Except that in Fragonard's painting, the jug is not broken, but only overturned. It means that the innocent is still there, but mistreated. It is a kind of still life with an MC at the far left of the painting of what happened between the characters. On the far right, we started with flowers, we finish with flowers. Generally, you don't see it, this rose, red rose. And I give you 10 seconds to find it. It is in a strategic place, at the meaning point of the three colors of the painting. It forms the keystone of the color, and it is here, from the bed, that it was left. The red was for passionate love, of course. I say keystone because it is very appropriate. This rose makes the link, allows the dialogue, the correspondence between colors.
And we are going to be more interested in this current match. White first. This absolutely frightening man, sure, this crazy quality of the draped folds, the sleeve, the color that falls back, and and this, this bird talks well in front of the spectator. This is the first thing we see, but that's not only what we have to focus on. So, everyone, keep calm. What is interesting is the correspondence between the lady's petticoat and the bedsheet. Same color, same materials, same light rendering. Material comes balance, and so iconographic correspondence. And so, if we treated this corner of the bed by anthropomorphism, we would easily see me, then a thigh, then we go back up this el engaged body to the two pillows, including the sharp corners that easily suggest of priests. Moreover, if we wanted to have fun, we will pair this part of the painting in a pendant with a certain painting by Gustave Courbet in 1866, almost 100 years after, kept at the Musée d'Orsay, "The Origin of the World" with the red dan. And if we perceive and further, we will see in the canopy of shape fade, you know. And if we find a vagina, we have to look for the other part. Is in theta. And when we see this from meanings, the other part of the canopy which falls back into these forms of - completely improbable boat. You have your pennies then.
Who, how, and why did we get to this painting? Well, Jean Honoré Fragonard was born in 1732 in the pretty little town of Grasse in Provence and died in 1865. At first, we thought of him, and we hoped him, especially the great falls of around encyclopedia writer, did Howe, that he will represent the new generation of history painters, do the great painting, noble, non-historical, were in mythological ranges, and is to say, the subject at the top of this gender pyramid. Except that it was not at all what Fragonard liked to do. He liked to make portraits and especially genre scenes. Nevertheless, he did his formal education at the Academy. He attended the studio of the great official painter, Boucher. He went to Rome with a barrel there, where he could observe the antics and the great Italian painters. Here he did a fashionable painting at the with a 15, and then there with a 16. He returned to Italy in 1774, and even if a lot of people went to this beautiful neighboring country, it is not like today where we easily leave them on a low-cost trip. At this moment, to travel for months, and it continued its journey to Flanders, and where he notably admired Rembrandt. It was from this journey, from a failure since Fragonard was refused an order for the Countess du Barry, the 15th favorite, that he will demonstrate his ability to renew himself, especially in the face of neoclassicism, which was becoming the new taste. And he will once again metamorphosis today's painting with more contrast between light and dark, as here in "The Bolt," and a more controlled blurring effect, which will soften the lines, and a smoother, more icy touch, less creamy, if you want.
And here, this is the culmination of Fragonard's painting. If Antoine Watteau represents the first generation, the creator of the fête galante, François Boucher represents the second generation, full control and official painting genre. Fragonard embodies the third generation, and we are talking about libertine painting. In fact, I reduced to the simplest, but in truth, it is more complicated than that, of course. But it is true that in this last quarter of the 18th century, we are in 1777. Lots of things are happening: the philosophy of the Enlightenment, the appearance of the woman's novel with Rousseau, in particular, the return of historical painting and moral painting, the reign of Louis XVI and economics and economical problems, and the reform of the state, the criticism of the nobility and the system of social orders. The French Revolution is less than twenty years later. And at this time, we did not have access to Internet, CNN, or BBC news. So, it takes a little more time for things to stop. All of this is the context for "The Bolt," and it is a context that Fragonard is not to only want to live. Five years later, in 1782, a certain Pierre Choderlos de Laclos will publish "Les Liaisons dangereuses." And I'll be able to make an hour of video on the links between this epistle and Fragonard's family, but I can't. So, I'll just give you some probative information, mainly that Fragonard painted the portrait of Marie-Thérèse de Launay, who will play the role of the Marquise de Merteuil in a theatrical adaptation of "Dangerous Liaisons." And especially that Jean-Baptiste Fragonard, his son, therefore Alexandre-Évariste Fragonard, and his sister-in-law and pupil accomplice, Marguerite Gérard, will illustrate the 1796 edition of "Dangerous Liaisons." Of course, we can easily say that "The Bolt" itself is an anticipated recitation of the "Valmont-Cécile" or "Valmont-Tourvel" relationship from the novel. Let's say that it is the atmosphere of the time, in any case, that allows the links between these two works, because criticism of the nobility, indulgence in libertinism, because libertine social atmosphere due to are of the high society or close, throughout society who get rid of the real problems, problems experienced by a large part of the population. This is the context. With all of this, you understand the interest of this painting, why it is important, while it is exciting, what stage it reveals in the history of art, how it was built, and what the erratic or critical or artistic messages are. Pictures like this, it is both the intelligence and the soul of the 18th century.
So, it was all about analyzing past reconciliation. But the interpretation of this painting, I leave it to you. Love or rape? She wants to, but cannot, because the Quran forbids her, because she's married, and she cannot give in to a libertine, even if she has passionate feelings for him. All the key to understanding that you have just add allow you to make up your own mind. What we are going to agree on with almost coat that love is cruel when it is--it raged. Here you go. I'm very sorry for my English or my accent, but thank you for watching this video. I hope you enjoyed it. Do not hesitate to tell me what you thought with a comment, subscribe or share me, and see you soon on Architect.
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