The Salon
“History is written by the victors.” Winston Churchill (1874 -1965). While the names, dates,
and details of battles may be accurately reported there is a tendency to makes heroes out of
the victors and villains out of the losers. In the 19th century an epic battle between styles of art
was being fought with the epic centre of the struggle being in Paris, France. Without a doubt,
for about one and half centuries the French Salon held almost complete power over the French
art scene and by extension, it provided a rudder for Western art. But, the eventual demise of
the Salon’s influence was so complete that few people in the world can name the artists and
artworks that won its coveted stamp of approval. Yet a great number know of the artists who
were rejected by the Salon; Manet, Monet, Cezanne, Van Gogh and Renoir.
The Salon basically held power by bestowing a public viewing on the art it approved. In
1737, the Louvre opened to the public an enormous juried art show, re-openings occurring
every odd numbered year. It was composed of select stakeholders in the art world, artists, art
critics, patrons of the arts, academics and somewhat hidden was the arm of government
working behind the scenes. .
King Louis XIV (1638-1715) is famous for saying "L'État, c'est moi", (The state, that’s me). For a
good part of the 18th century the monarchy was the main power in France and indirectly, the King called
the tune when it came to the arts. The Salon was even held in the Louvre which was the summer
palace to the Monarchy. The French revolution (1789 to 1799) caused a great fracturing of
society and ripple effects were felt for a century and continue even today. This set the stage for
a battle between various art styles that eventually was decidedly won by the avant-garde.
Today we can easily find art calendars, art books and biographies of the French impressionists
and post impressionists and various modern art movements. History books, the modern
cultural, the art establishment, academia, curriculums is operating a new kind of Salon which
gives a stamp of approval on various art forms and disapproval to others.
The battle between the avant-garde and the conservative elements in art was not won in the
lifetime of the combatants. In 1863 out of 5000 works submitted, 2800 were rejected by the
jury. Getting an artwork shown into the Salon was a ticket to being able to sell you art. One
artist on hearing that his artwork had been refused, committed suicide. As late as 1881 Renoir
said “There are barely 15 art lovers in Paris capable of liking an artist with the Salon. There are
80,000 of them who will not even buy a nose if the painter is not in the Salon.”
The successful artists exhibited in the Paris Salon show transitions in
where power was centered. The Sleeping Shepherdess, 1750 by
Francois Boucher shows the idyllic, decorative, romanticized, Rococo
dreams of the aristocracy prior to the revolution.
Even before the revolution, republican ideas were circulating was
and the thinkers and the intelligencia began to look to the ancient
Romans and Greeks for ideas. This tendency sped up with the
beginning of revolution of 1789 and the rise of Napoleon who became dictator in 1799. The
new French society which had threw off Christianity created as
a new god an idealized new Roman Republic based on Greek
philosophy and the Roman sense of civic duty. Women
adopted Greek fashions and at one point politicians actually
donned Roman togas when parliaments were in session. Art
portrayed Roman historical or mythological subject matter with
heavy emphasis on duty: "What is good for the swarm is not good
for the bee." Marcus Aurelius. One such example in the Oath of
Horatii painted by Napoleon’s favorite painter, Jacques Louis David in 1784.
With the final defeat of Napoleon in 1815 at Waterloo, the search
for meaning in life continued in divergent directions but the Salon
tended to be locked into the recent past; themes from Roman and
Greek mythology, an unemotional Neo-classical, hyper-realistic style
was championed by Jean August
Dominique Ingres(1780-1867) as in his
painting of Napoleon executed in 1806.
Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) was the
leader of the French Romantic School that
gravitated to exotic subject matter, warm
colors and an energetic painting style.
Arab Horseman Attacked by a Lion painted in 1849 is an example
of this style. Delacroix described Ingres as “narrow-minded” and
“Chinese” meaning finicky. Ingres called Delacroix “the apostle of
ugliness” and the drunken broom.
French society became more divided as time went on, as evidenced by changes in
government and the brief Paris Commune of 1871 in 1863, perhaps as a means of quelling
unrest, Napoleon III allowed artists whose work had been refused by the Salon, opened up the
Salon Des Refuses, for the excluded artists. By in large, visitors to the Salon Des Refuses came
to mock and laugh at the artworks as they would a freak show, or the less talented contestants
in something like American Idol,
1. Draw a 15 minute sketch of a painting by a French Rococo Artist: Boucher, Watteau,
Fragonard. What does this say about French society of the time? Text 460-464
2. Draw a 15 minute sketch of a Neo-classical painting: ie. David or Ingres. What does
this say about the segment of French society appreciative of that style of art? Text 481486
3. Draw a 15 minute sketch of a painting by a French Romantic Artist: i.e. Delacroix,
Geircault. What can you say about the movement of French society that patronized the
Romantic art. Text 487-488