Art of the XVIII century differs radically from that of the preceding
century. It is graceful, elegant and coquettish rather than ponderous,
majestic and passionate. Forgotten is the fervent piety of the
Counter-Reformation and the oppressive grandeur of le Roi Soleil. Life is
joyful, to be lived in luxurious boudoirs, exquisite in refinement of
decoration, or in pretty gardens where Nature, properly disguised,
welcomes aristocratic shepherds and shepherdesses to her pastoral
delights.
The changed political and social conditions of the XVIII century had their
immediate effect in the world of art. Except in England—relatively
democratic as compared with France and other continental countries—art was
almost exclusively aristocratic, and mirrored the self-indulgent interests
of fashionable patrons. Even in England, where Hogarth moralized for the
bourgeoisie, and the sturdy lineaments of the commoner were portrayed by a
Reynolds or Gainsborough no less frequently, and truthfully, than the
high-bred mien of a great nobleman, artistic concessions to the Third
Estate were distinctly limited. It was in courtly France, soon to be
racked by social revolution, that the epicurean art of the XVIII century
was most at home. When we name Watteau, Boucher, Fragonard, Clodion,
Houdon, we sum up, perhaps, all that is most characteristic of painting
and sculpture in XVIII century art. The portrait painters of England
contribute to the century the meed of their greatness; Italy gains lustre
through Tiepolo; Spain through Goya; but it is to France that we turn to
experience in its completeness the spirit of the Rococo.
In the “century of little things” the minor arts attained an exceptional
importance. Artisans ranked as artists, and justly. Among the
distinguished artists of the XVIII century must be included such great
craftsmen as Chippendale, Sheraton, Hepplewhite, Oeben, Riesener,
Gouthiere, and Caffieri—to make but a brief selection from among the
numerous English and French cabinet-makers, metal chasers, and other
craftsmen of the period. The productions of these celebrated artisans
were rightly looked upon as works of creative art of a high order, and the
makers were accorded the patronage and protection of royalty and nobility.
In technical perfection the XVIII century crafts have never been
surpassed. But too great proficiency led sometimes to artistic disaster,
as we may note in tapestries imitating the difficulties of inappropriate
pictorial models, or in the florid carving sometimes indulged in by the
cabinet-makers—even the celebrated Chippendale, if the truth be told.
These occasional deviations from the path of artistic rectitude must not
mislead us, however, from a just appreciation of the extraordinary merits
of XVIII century decorative art.
[Head of an Old Man. Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo, 1727-1804]