 | This pastel engraving titled "Tête de Flore (Head of Flora)" (circa 1769) is among the works on view in the Yale University Art Gallery's next exhibition. |
Images created during one of the most groundbreaking periods in the history
of color printmaking will be featured in a new exhibition at the Yale University
Art Gallery.
T H I S
The color printmaking revolution
is highlighted in new exhibition
“Colorful Impressions: The Printmaking Revolution in 18th-Century France,” which
opens on Tuesday, Jan. 29, showcases works that were made during a period when
newly invented engraving and etching methods were joined with novel ways of printing
a single image from multiple plates. The revolution in printmaking meant that,
for the first time, full-color prints could be created from the three basic colors — red,
yellow and blue — plus black. Within a few decades, thousands of images
were produced, including some of the most complex color prints ever made.
Organized by the National Gallery of Art, the gallery’s presentation
of “Colorful Impressions” includes over 100 images, many of which
are presented in multiple impressions or alongside related drawings. Among
the artists whose designs were reproduced by printmakers are some of the most
famous of the 18th century, including Jean-Antoine Watteau, François
Boucher, Jean-Baptiste Greuze, Jean-Honoré Fragonard and Hubert Robert.
The ability to create multiple reproductions of a painting or drawing allowed
the middle class to be able to afford the “same” works of art as
their aristocratic counterparts, note the exhibit organizers. This burgeoning
print market included a wide variety of subjects, portraits, landscapes, allegories
and genre scenes, as well as more mundane items such as travel illustrations,
textile and wallpaper motifs, maps and button covers.
Most of the works in the exhibition reflect “the carefree spirit of the
ancien régime — an era of self-indulgence among the upper classes
before the French Revolution of 1789,” organizers say, but the exhibition
also evokes the gradually changing spirit of 18th-century France during this
time.
Highlights of the exhibition include Jakob Christoffel Le Blon’s color
mezzotint portrait of Louis XV (1739) and four color proofs from his “Portrait
of Anthony van Dyck”; Jacques-Fabien Gautier Dagoty’s “anatomical
angel”; Louis-Marin Bonnet’s pastel-manner “Téte de
Flore” (“Head of Flora,” 1769), in five different impressions,
and his so-called “English prints” — partially printed with
gold leaf; 10 progressive proofs for Charles-Melchior Descourtis’ “Noce
de village” (“Village Wedding,” 1785) and 10 prints by Philibert-Louis
Debucourt, considered the last of the great color printmakers.
About two-thirds of the objects on display belong to the National Gallery of
Art in Washington, D.C. The rest are lent from the family collection of Yale
alumnus Ivan E. Phillips ’56.
“Colorful Impressions” will be on view through May 4. Special events
being offered in conjunction with the exhibition include free gallery talks on
Feb. 19, 26 and 27. On Tuesday, Feb. 12, at 4 p.m. Alicia Weisberg-Roberts, a
postdoctoral research associate at the Yale Center for British Art, will present
a talk titled “Reproducing the Rococo.” Kristel Smentek, adjunct
professor in the history of decorative arts and design at Cooper-Hewitt, National
Design Museum, will discuss “Selling Color Prints in 18th-Century Paris” on
Tuesday, Feb. 19, at 4 p.m. The following week, Stéphane Roy, postdoctoral
research associate at the Yale Center for British Art, will discuss “France
and England Showing Their Colors: Rivalry, Emulation and Printmaking Innovation
in the 18th Century” at 4 p.m. The following day, at 12:20 p.m., Margaret
Morgan Grasselli, curator of Old Master drawings at the National Gallery, will
speak on “True Colors: Genius and Invention in French Printmaking in the
18th Century.”
The presentation of “Colorful Impressions” at the Yale Art Gallery
was organized by Suzanne Boorsch, the Robert L. Solley Curator of Prints, Drawings
and Photographs. The exhibit was supported by an endowment made possible by
a challenge grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
The Yale University Art Gallery, 1111 Chapel St., is open to the public free
of charge Tuesday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. (Thursdays until 8 p.m. Sept.-June);
and Sunday, 1-5 p.m. For more information, visit http://artgallery.yale.edu
or call (203) 432-0600.
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