The History of Modern Painting, Volume 1 (of 4): Revised edition continued by the author to the end of the XIX centuryMuther, Richard
History
The History of Modern Painting, Volume 1 (of 4): Revised edition continued by the author to the end of the XIX century
Muther, Richard
Painting -- History
Even in 1763 Grimm could write: "For some years past we have been making
keen inquiry for antique ornaments and forms. The predilection for them
has become so universal that now everything is to be done _à la
Grecque_. The interior and exterior decorations of houses, furniture,
dress material, and goldsmiths' work all bear alike the stamp of the
Greeks. The fashion passes from architecture to millinery: our ladies
have their hair dressed _à la Grecque_, our fine gentlemen would think
themselves dishonoured if they did not hold in their hands _une boîte à
la Grecque_." Even Diderot's preference for the ethical and emotional,
as Greuze had painted it--and as Diderot himself had dramatised
it--veered round at the commencement of the sixties into an enthusiasm
for the antique. After 1761 he carried on in the salons a war of
extermination against poor old Boucher, and lectured him in a menacing
voice upon the "great and severe taste of antiquity." He twitted him
with possessing neither reality nor taste, and produced in proof the
fact that, in the whole catalogue of Boucher's figures, not four could
be found which could be employed in relief, or even as statues. The new
taste demanded pure and simple lines, the beauty of sculpture; it went
back to the antique. When a French translation of Winckelmann appeared
in 1765 he spoke out, on the occasion of a review of the book, clearly
and plainly: "_Il me semble qu'il faudrait étudier l'antique pour
apprendre à voir la nature_." In the same vein Watelet pronounced on
Boucher: "_Jamais artiste n'a plus ouvertement témoigné son mépris pour
la vraie beauté telle qu'elle a été sentie et exprimée par les
statuaires_ _de l'ancienne Grèce_." Thus the change in the artistic
outlook was heralded long before the curtain went up upon the events of
1789.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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