Le Bran’s successor in the direction of the Academy and the Gobelin
works, Pierre Mignard (1612-1695), called “Le Romain” owing to his long
domicile in Rome after the completion of his studies under Vouet, did
not have his precursor’s large decorative faculty and sweeping ease of
execution. Yet the excessively affected grace and the careful finish
of his pictures, of which _The Virgin of the Grapes_ (No. 628) is a
thoroughly characteristic instance, helped to raise him to an exalted
position in the opinion of his contemporaries. To this day the affected
style of prettiness of which he was the high priest is known as
“_mignardise_.” His power was altogether insufficient for the ambitious
decorative tasks he set himself in emulation of Le Brun. If he has any
claim to the esteem of posterity, it is for having left the world a
portrait gallery of the notable men and women of his time—portraits
which are by no means free from flattery and mannered grace, but
constitute, nevertheless, a valuable historical record. Of these the
Louvre owns the _Portrait of the Artist at Work in his Studio_ (No.
640); the _Portrait of Françoise d’Aubigne, Marquise de Maintenon_ (No.
639); and the life-size group of _Louis of France, Son of Louis XIV.,
his Wife, and their three Children_ (No. 638).
Colbert and Le Brun had succeeded but too well in carrying out the
powerful minister’s ambition to direct French art towards industrial
and decorative aims, to train an army of capable producers, and to
place the whole organisation on what may be called a business basis.
The system was, however, not favourable for the growth of independent
genius. With few exceptions, the whole generation of painters that
grew up under Le Brun’s régime are of no significance to the history
of art. There were among them many capable craftsmen, but they only
repeated in a feebler way what Le Brun had done on a more imposing and
dazzling scale. Whole dynasties of painters arose, like the Boulognes
and the Coypels, who, under official patronage, filled acres of canvas
with florid, theatrical renderings of scriptural subjects, and with the
bombastic mock-heroics of classic history and mythology seen through
baroque spectacles.