Portraiture and Politics In Revolutionary France

There’s a painting in this book’s introduction, of an old man in a brown coat, book in hand, gazing somberly away from the viewer. The man’s brown coat matches the dark browns of the empty background, and as far as his looks go, the artist makes no attempt to flatter. Gone are the beautiful faces of Georgian era portraits, where everyone has ivory skin and poses with a raised hand. Whoever this man was, he didn’t want to look attractive. He wanted to look serious.

The painting's description has me correct on all points. The man wanted to look serious, but there was another reason for the ruggedness of the portrait; he was a spokesman for the Revolutionary movement, and though a well-known orator, he was also a commoner. He would have viewed the previous styles as much too elitist for his taste; ivory skin and delicate faces were now seen as dainty and unmanly.

As for the style of painting, with wide brushstrokes and no backdrop, it had as much to with economics as it did with attitudes. The artists no longer had royal patronage, so whoever could afford a portrait would’ve offered less money. It made sense for the artist to develop a faster style using fewer colors. As the revolution progresses, we see the portraits getting more and more colorful, with more elaborate costumes. The paintings of Jacques- Louis David (famous for the painting of Marat dead in the bathtub) feature common people, including writers and revolutionary orators, in fine-tailored suits. They sit at desks writing, with furniture getting finer and finer, probably stolen from a recently chased-out aristocrat.

The author, Amy Freund, isn’t entirely convinced of the “revolutionary” attitudes of the time, however. In the 1790’s, many of the portraits were of army officers in the service of the new government, and these men were obviously living well off the public dime. At the same time, though they sat for portraits in splendid uniforms, they don’t seem to have entirely given up their dislike of elitist visages. The painting National Guard Officer and His Wife clearly shows an elderly couple, both look to be about 70 (or older) and no attempt is made to have them look younger. The description says that this man was a peasant, and he was given an honorary officer’s rank as a way to forcibly integrate the classes. The wife, however, doesn’t wear the same splendid clothes as her husband; she still wears the clothes of a peasant, and she has a stern look.

    To sum up, the portraits of Revolutionary France were propaganda. It was the new regime’s way of showing everyone that the old class system was over, and former subjects were now citizens. In some ways it’s sarcastic irony, compared to earlier French artwork. Remember the famous 1767 painting The Swing, where the woman allows her skirt to blow up, to the amusement of the foppish young man hiding in the bushes? This was precisely the frivolous imagery that annoyed the revolutionaries, who viewed the nobility as lazy, wasteful, and amoral, coupled with cowardice and imbecility. Notice the hat the woman wears in the painting? It’s a shepherdess’ hat, ironic in that the shepherdess is usually a symbol of virtue in artwork.

By the 1800’s, the economics of portraiture were back to normal again. The book ends with the Anonymous Family Portrait, featuring what appears to be the father, two grown sons, and two younger children. He must have had money, because the youngest child plays a piano, and the older sons are all well dressed. The father, however, is unshaven, with a double chin and messy hair. His clothing too is unkempt, and the older son has his eyes cast downward. This man still has the embodiment of the revolutionary ideal of manliness in his disdain for delicacy.

In some ways this book reminds me of the USA in the late 60’s and early 70’s, where it became the vogue for the rich to entertain the radical. Those of you who read Tom Wolfe’s Radical Chic know of Leonard Bernstein’s “hip” parties; catered fund-raisers for the Black Panthers, held at their 20-room apartment in Manhattan. Then there was Ted Kennedy’s Lincoln Center fundraiser for an upstate NY “boy’s home,” with a souvenir book featuring a smiling boy on the cover. His name was Willie Bosket.

The wealthy American liberals, once enamored with radical causes, mostly lost interest. By the 1980’s, Reagan’s conservative platform made patriotism hip, and the new generation embraced Wall Street, money, and materialism. However, unlike the American fascination with 60’s radicalism, the French didn’t seem to lose their sense of anti-elitism. It’s true that the Anonymous Family Portrait of 1800 features a return towards gentility, but the middle-aged man in the center still chooses roughness. Perhaps his children, obviously more fastidious in their grooming, are too young to remember the feeling of the revolutionary era?

I bet his sons became the corporate raiders of the era.