Meeting Waterloo

Place du Chatelet And Its Fountain is an 1810 oil painting by Etienne Bouhot. It predates Napoleon's fall after Waterloo and his final years on St. Helena.

After Napoleon met his end in exile, his body was eventually repatriated to France. These items are models for aspects of his funerary arrangements.

The exhibit also included relics- a lock of hair, wax impressions from his sword, and a death mask in bronze.

The legacy of Napoleon was a complicated one in France in the decades after his death: how do you pay tribute to him? Or do you pay tribute to him? The exhibit examined his own plans for Paris, some of which never came to fruition, as well as those commemorations of his time. This miniature version of the 1865 statue of Josephine, backed by an engraving of the real statue done in 1867, reflects the efforts of Napoleon III to honour both Napoleon and Josephine; interestingly, he was her maternal grandson, while also a nephew of his namesake- that gets a bit complicated.

This is Apotheosis Of Napoleon I, Copy Of The Sketch For The Ceiling Of The Napoleon III Salon At Paris City Hall, dating to around 1870. It was done as a copy of the original, which was destroyed in 1871 by fire during the time of the Paris Commune.

I finish this series with a model of the Vendome Column on the right, and on the left, Figure Of Victory Held By The Statue Of Napoleon On The Vendome Column, an 1808 bronze by the artist Antoine-Denis Chaudet. It was first used to be held by the statue of Napoleon in full Roman regalia, which was melted down on orders by Louis XVIII in 1814. The bronze survived, and was incorporated into a new column honouring Napoleon under Napoleon III. That column was destroyed during the Paris Commune, and yet Figure Of Victory survived again.

All in all, this exhibit on the man and his impact on Paris was enlightening and fascinating. The city and the country was changed forever because of him, and we can't imagine what France would be like today had there never been a Napoleon Bonaparte. 

Tomorrow I'll start showing you another special exhibit that was going on here at the Museum.

Of Art And Artifacts

This oil painting is by Etienne Bouhot from 1813. Titled The Tuileries Gardens And Palace Seen From the Quai d'Orsay, it shows the imperial gardens and palace in the final years of Napoleon's days of power. The gardens are still around today, but the palace was destroyed during the days of the Paris Commune in 1871.

There were also items of Napoleon's time on display, such as fashion- including these slippers and fan, and the bed in the second shot.

The breastplate you see here is steel and engraved brass. It was Napoleon's ceremonial breastplate. The chest beneath it, open for display, was his campaign kit, which impressed me. It contains 110 items, neatly packed together, with personal grooming and dining items, as well as working tools. Napoleon had commissioned it from a goldsmith named Martin-Guillaume Biennais.

This painting from 1833 is by the artist Louis-Charles Auguste Couder. Napoleon I Viewing The Staircase Of The Louvre, Accompanied By Architects Percier And Fontaine shows the Emperor and the architects whose work on what was the Musee Napoleon and is today the Louvre amid the splendour of the building, which shows signs of being worked on.

The Church Of The Feuillants Being Demolished is a work by Hubert Robert dating back to around 1804, showing the dismantling of a church during the Revolutionary period- this church stood near the Tuileries.

Imperial Ambitions

This song seems appropriate for the subject matter I'm dealing with at the moment.

This huge bust of Napoleon is the work of Lorenzo Bartolini, dating back to 1805. It captures him in imperial glory, evoking the Roman style. The neck is longer than it should be for a good reason- this once dominated the entrance of the Louvre (the Musee Napoleon in his day), and people would have to look up at it, and so elongating the neck was a visual requirement.

The Conscripts of 1807 Marching Past Saint-Denis Gate is the title of this oil painting by Louis-Leopold Boilly.

Boilly also painted this, The Galleries Of The Palais-Royal, which depicts an area near the Louvre which was considered a fashionable meeting place. By evening it was a place known for prostitutes to sell their services- the story goes that as a fresh faced lieutenant, Napoleon lost his virginity here.

This oil painting caught my eye- an artist named Bizard painted this in 1802. The Pump On The Cours-la-Reine depicts efforts to supply Paris with water at the time, amid construction projects like the Ourcq Canal.

The Garden of The Museum Of French Monuments, A Former Convent of The Petits-Augustins is the title of this painting by Hubert Robert. A former convent that served as a place of safety for decorative sculptures saved during the worst of the French Revolution, this was dismantled when Napoleon's empire finally fell.

Here are two takes on the same item, with and without an onlooker, which I think actually added to the scene. This is one of the large scale reproductions in the exhibit, the original of which is an 1810 painting by Jean-Baptiste Regnault, titled, Napoleon Signing The Marriage Contract Of Jerome Bonaparte and Catherine of Wurtemberg, August 22, 1807.

Napoleon And Paris

Napoleon & Paris examined the role of the military officer turned emperor and his influence on Paris down through time. The Canadian Museum of History presented the exhibit in collaboration with the Musee Carnavalet and Paris Musees, with artifacts, art, sketches, models, and reproductions from the Carnavalet, the Louvre, and other collections on display. You can see a video on the exhibition here. Fortunately photography was allowed, though not flash photography, so items like a uniform or his hat that had caught my eye didn't really photograph well. The exhibit shows the visitor both the timeline of Napoleon's life, and the various ways his rule and presence influenced the development of the city and France as a whole. What may be a surprise to the visitor is that Napoleon spent less time in Paris during his rule than he did picking fights with half the world. 

The first thing the visitor was greeted with was this formal portrait of Napoleon, an oil painting by Robert Lefevre, with his throne beside him. Bonaparte is wearing his favourite uniform, from his days as a colonel.

The walls of the exhibition as I passed through tended to have large scale reproductions of paintings etched onto the surface- this allowed you to get right up close to them. Such was the case with a detailed section of The Imperial Guard Entering Paris Through The Pantin Gate, November 25th, 1807, situated close to the introductory overview of Napoleon's tumultuous life. The original work was done by Nicolas-Antoine Taunay at some point between 1808-1810.

A bust of a young Napoleon, done in 1798 by sculptor Charles-Louis Corbet, captures the general at the time of his Italian campaign. It has a portrait, Josephine de Beauharnais, as its neighbour. Napoleon married the young widow in 1796. The oil painting was done in 1799 by Andrea Appiani.

This portrait, Lucien Bonaparte, is an oil painting by Francois-Xavier Fabre, circa 1800, depicting the younger brother of the Emperor.

This is another one of the large scale reproductions- The Consecration Of Emperor Napoleon And The Coronation Of Empress Josephine On December 2, 1804. The original work is by Jacques-Louis David, done in 1807. It is interesting to be able to get up so close to examine the details of a very familiar work, something I imagine can't be done with the original.

An oil painting, View Of The Grand Theatre Erected In Place de la Concorde for the Peace Celebrations, 18 Brumaire, Year X, is found here. It is by the artist Jean-Baptiste Cazin, painted in 1801. That particular date reflects a short lived Revolutionary calendar concept. The date itself was November 9th, marking peace with Austria- which would come to an end just a few years later. 

This pairing caught my eye. The first is a notice for information on those conspiring against Napoleon. The second is an 1804 coloured etching, Pichegru Being Arrested, featuring General Pichegru getting nabbed by the police- his subsequent strangulation in his cell with his own cravat was deemed a suicide by officials, while Bonaparte's enemies maintained it was murder.

It Is Mightier Than The Sword

Bruce MacKinnon, Halifax Chronicle-Herald

Paresh Nath, The Khaleej Times

Patrick Chappatte, International New York Times

Rainer Hachfeld, Neues Deutchland