Biography
He was born at Troyes. His father was a foundry worker. He was first trained as a joiner and woodcarver. His talent attracted the attention of the Chancellor of Louis XIV, Pierre Séguier, a serious patron of the arts, who arranged for him to work in the studio of François Anguier, and later, from 1648 to 1650 to live and apprentice in Rome. There he saw Baroque sculpture and met Bernini, but he came to reject that style and moved instead toward classicism and the models of ancient Roman sculpture.
In 1650 he returned to France, and became a member of the group of artists, led by Charles Le Brun, the official painter of the King, and including the garden designer André Le Nôtre, who were commissioned to decorate the new royal park of the Chateau of Versailles. His principal contribution was the group of statuary representing Apollo served by the Nymphs, (1666-1675), symbolizing the Sun King himself, placed in a grotto close to the Palace. The figure of Apollo was inspired in form by the Apollo Belvedere of the Vatican, and featured two groups of figures; Apollo surrounded by nymphs, and a second group, next to the grotto, showing The Horses of the Sun being conducted to their royal stable.
He created another fountain for Versailles, the Basin of Saturn or Winter (1672-1677), made of gilded lead, composed in a more baroque style, crowded with figures. His third major work at Versailles was the Kidnapping of Proserpine. This group of statues was located away from the center of the garden, and was designed to seen from a single point of view. The sense of movement and twisted figures give it a Baroque appearance, but this is balanced by the classical clarity and symmetry of the composition.
Girardon rose steadily in the official artistic hierarchy. He became a member of the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture in 1657, was raised to professor, in 1674 assistant to the Rector. In 1690, on the death of Le Brun, he became inspector general of works of sculpture, governing all royal sculptural commissions. In 1695, he became Chancellor of the Royal Academy.
In 1675 he received another important commission, for the tomb of Cardinal Richelieu, located in the Chapel of the Sorbonne. It was completed in 1694. The figure of the Cardinal is shown seated on the tomb but alive, sitting up and looking toward the altar. (The tomb was originally placed in the choir of the church, but has since been moved to a separate chapel). He is accompanied by figures of two grieving women representing Religion and science. The tomb was completed in 1694, and had considerable influence on the design of later funeral sculpture. It was nearly destroyed by a mob during the French Revolution, but was protected by the archeologist Alexandre Lenoir, who received a bayonet wound in its defense. He had it moved to safety in the first museum of French monuments.
In 1699, Girardon completed another major work, a bronze equestrian statue of Louis XIV, which was placed in the center in the center of Place Louis le Grand (now Place Vendôme). This statue was melted down during the French Revolution and is now known only by a small bronze model made by Girardon himself, in the Louvre, He died in Paris in 1715.
Other notable work of Girardon that can still be seen include Tomb of Louvois in the Church of (St-Eustache) in Paris; the tomb of Bignon, the King's librarian, made in 1656, in (St-Nicolas du Chardonnet); and decorative sculptures in the Gallery of Apollo and the King's Bedroom in the Louvre.
The municipal museum of his birthplace of Troyes has several of his works, marble busts of Louis XIV and Maria Theresa. The Town Hall displays a medallion of Louis XIV, and the Church of Saint Remy displays a bronze crucifix he made.
Jules Hardouin-Mansart was a French Baroque architect and builder whose major work included the Place des Victoires (1684–1690); Place Vendôme (1690); the domed chapel of Les Invalides (1690), and the Grand Trianon of the Palace of Versailles. His monumental work was designed to glorify the reign of Louis XIV of France.
Charles Antoine Coysevox, was a French sculptor in the Baroque and Louis XIV style, best known for his sculpture decorating the gardens and Palace of Versailles and his portrait busts.
Nicolas Coustou was a French sculptor and academic.
Guillaume Coustou the Elder was a French sculptor of the Baroque and Louis XIV style. He was a royal sculptor for Louis XIV and Louis XV and became Director of the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in 1735. He is best known for his monumental statues of horses made for the Chateau of Marly, whose replicas now stand in the Place de la Concorde in Paris.
Pierre Paul Puget was a French Baroque painter, sculptor, architect and engineer. His sculpture expressed emotion, pathos and drama, setting it apart from the more classical and academic sculpture of the Style Louis XIV.
Baron François Joseph Bosio was a Monegasque sculptor who achieved distinction in the first quarter of the nineteenth century with his work for Napoleon and for the restored French monarchy.
François Duquesnoy or Frans Duquesnoy was a Flemish Baroque sculptor who was active in Rome for most of his career, where he was known as Il Fiammingo. His idealized representations represented a quieter and more restrained version of Italian baroque sculpture, and are often contrasted with the more dramatic and emotional character of Bernini's works, while his style shows a great affinity to Algardi's sculptures.
French Baroque architecture, usually called French classicism, was a style of architecture during the reigns of Louis XIII (1610–1643), Louis XIV (1643–1715) and Louis XV (1715–1774). It was preceded by French Renaissance architecture and Mannerism and was followed in the second half of the 18th century by French Neoclassical architecture. The style was originally inspired by the Italian Baroque architecture style, but, particularly under Louis XIV, it gave greater emphasis to regularity, the colossal order of facades, and the use of colonnades and cupolas, to symbolize the power and grandeur of the King. Notable examples of the style include the Grand Trianon of the Palace of Versailles, and the dome of Les Invalides in Paris. In the final years of Louis XIV and the reign of Louis XV, the colossal orders gradually disappeared, the style became lighter and saw the introduction of wrought iron decoration in rocaille designs. The period also saw the introduction of monumental urban squares in Paris and other cities, notably Place Vendôme and the Place de la Concorde. The style profoundly influenced 18th-century secular architecture throughout Europe; the Palace of Versailles and the French formal garden were copied by other courts all over Europe.
Gilles Guérin (1611–1678) was a French sculptor, who created tomb sculptures and decorative sculptures for interiors, which were executed in a Baroque idiom. He was born and died in Paris. He was a pupil of the sculptor Nicolas Le Brun, the father of the painter Charles Le Brun.
Martin Desjardins, born Martin van den Bogaert was a French sculptor and stuccoist of Dutch birth.
Pierre Le Gros the Elder was a French sculptor in the service of King Louis XIV.
Jean-Baptiste Tuby was a French sculptor of Italian origins, best known for the sculpture in the fountains of the Gardens of Versailles. His work expresses the exuberance of the Baroque blended with the classicism of the Louis XIV style.
Baroque sculpture is the sculpture associated with the Baroque style of the period between the early 17th and mid 18th centuries. In Baroque sculpture, groups of figures assumed new importance, and there was a dynamic movement and energy of human forms—they spiralled around an empty central vortex, or reached outwards into the surrounding space. Baroque sculpture often had multiple ideal viewing angles, and reflected a general continuation of the Renaissance move away from the relief to sculpture created in the round, and designed to be placed in the middle of a large space—elaborate fountains such as Gian Lorenzo Bernini‘s Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, or those in the Gardens of Versailles were a Baroque speciality. The Baroque style was perfectly suited to sculpture, with Bernini the dominating figure of the age in works such as The Ecstasy of St Theresa (1647–1652). Much Baroque sculpture added extra-sculptural elements, for example, concealed lighting, or water fountains, or fused sculpture and architecture to create a transformative experience for the viewer. Artists saw themselves as in the classical tradition, but admired Hellenistic and later Roman sculpture, rather than that of the more "Classical" periods as they are seen today.
Sebastiaen Slodtz, in France called Sébastien Slodtz (1655–1726) was a Flemish sculptor and decorator who after training in his native Antwerp, moved to France where he became a court sculptor to the King. He was the father of three sons who helped further shape official French sculpture between the Baroque and the Rococo.
Robert Le Lorrain (1666–1743) was a French baroque sculptor who was born in Paris. He was born into a family of bureaucrats, the son of Claude Le Lorrain, a business agent of Nicolas Fouquet, Louis XIV's Minister of Finance. Le Lorrain was a student of the French sculptor, painter, and architect, Pierre Paul Puget (1620–1694). At age eighteen, Le Lorrain entered François Girardon's studio; aside from collaborating with him, he was commissioned to instruct Girardon's children in drawing and to supervise his other pupils. Le Lorrain won the Prix de Rome in 1689, On his return to Paris he first joined the Académie de Saint-Luc, and then was received into the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture in 1701; he became Rector of the Académie in 1737. His major non-royal clients were members of the house of Rohan. His students included Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne (1704–1778) and Jean-Baptiste Pigalle (1714–1785). Robert Le Lorrain died in Paris in 1743.
The Equestrian Statue of King Louis XIV is a sculpture designed and partially executed by the Italian artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini, who was originally brought to France to design a new facade of the Louvre, a portrait bust, and an equestrian statue. Bernini first discussed the project while in France in the mid-1660s, but it did not start until later in the decade, when back in Rome. It was not completed until 1684 and then shipped to Paris in 1685. Louis XIV of France was extremely unhappy with the end result and had it placed in a corner of the gardens of the royal palace at Versailles. Soon after, the sculpture was modified by François Girardon and altered into an equestrian sculpture of the ancient Roman hero Marcus Curtius.
The Louis XIV style or Louis Quatorze, also called French classicism, was the style of architecture and decorative arts intended to glorify King Louis XIV and his reign. It featured majesty, harmony and regularity. It became the official style during the reign of Louis XIV (1643–1715), imposed upon artists by the newly established Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture and the Académie royale d'architecture. It had an important influence upon the architecture of other European monarchs, from Frederick the Great of Prussia to Peter the Great of Russia. Major architects of the period included François Mansart, Jules Hardouin Mansart, Robert de Cotte, Pierre Le Muet, Claude Perrault, and Louis Le Vau. Major monuments included the Palace of Versailles, the Grand Trianon at Versailles, and the Church of Les Invalides (1675–1691).
French sculpture has been an original and influential component of world art since the Middle Ages. The first known French sculptures date to the Upper Paleolithic age. French sculpture originally copied ancient Roman models, then found its own original form in the decoration of Gothic architecture. French sculptors produced important works of Baroque sculpture for the decoration of the Palace of Versailles. In the 19th century, the sculptors Auguste Rodin and Edgar Degas created a more personal and non-realistic style, which led the way to modernism in the 20th century, and the sculpture of Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Marcel Duchamp and Jean Arp.
The Louis XIV Victory Monument was an elaborate trophy memorial celebrating the military and domestic successes of the early decades of Louis XIV's personal rule, primarily those during the Franco-Dutch War of 1672–1678, on the Place des Victoires in central Paris. It was designed and sculpted by Martin Desjardins between 1682 and 1686 on a commission by François d'Aubusson, Duke of La Feuillade. The monument's centerpiece, a colossal statue of Louis XIV crowned by an allegory of victory, was destroyed in 1792 during the French Revolution. Significant other parts of the monument have been preserved and are now mostly kept at the Louvre.
