The 18th century in France was a time where artists explored with the different forms and styles of art. These included: Rococo style, portraitures, sculptures, furniture, clothing, and many more. In order to create these artworks, many artists worked closely with pubic figures of France to help better represent them. Artists such as François Boucher worked on portraitures of Madame de Pompadour, while artist Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun worked on portraits depicting images of Marie Antoinette. Madame Pompadour and Marie Antoinette were huge female royalty public figures of France, and as public figures they had to hold beauty standards and expectations. Symbiotic relationship came to exist between women and artists, as both sought social preferment based on artificially perfected images of beauty (5). This meant that the artists would have to emphasize the beauty features of both Pompadour and Marie Antoinette. As we’ll see, besides working alongside public French female figures, another thing that these artists had in common was that they were criticized for the works that were published of these figures. The beauty standards and expectations of France were mainly held for female figures, for some men also, of the 18th century. With females being the subject of the artist, they are to be presented as aesthetically pleasing to the viewer (5). One way that was used to enhance aesthetic beauty was through the use of cosmetics by women and use of face-paint by the artist. Since Madame Pompadour and Marie Antoinette were public figures, they were expected to conform to cosmetic expectations The use of both would help fix the flaws, such as rough skin, freckles, pimples, warts, or scars, that women felt they had in order to enhance their reputation (5). Certain aspects, such as different colors, of cosmetics and face-paint had symbolic meanings. For example, white powder or face-paint symbolized things like purity, innocence, and modesty. Different shades of pink and red, such as creamy blends of pinks and seductive reds, were used as a way for the artist and figure to attract and arouse the attention of the public. One of the famous female figures that was popularly known in France was Madame de Pompadour. But, who was she and why was she considered an 18th century public figure in France? Madame Pompadour was born in Paris in 1721. It wasn’t until the year 1745 that she met one of the biggest public figure at that time in France at a masked ball at Versailles, Louis XV. From their first encounter at Versailles, Louis XV had asked and made Madame Pompadour his official chief mistress, now giving her the title of a “marquise.” This title gave Madame Pompadour a key role in the 18th century French arts, in which she focused on and was influenced by Rococo artistic praxis, Rococo aesthetics, and cosmetics (1). As a new figure of France, Madame de Pompadour began working closely with artist François Boucher. Boucher was an artist whose works used the Rococo style, hence why Madame de Pompadour wanted him to paint her in one of his famous works “Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, Marquise de Pompadour" (Figure 1). The oil on canvas painting by Boucher is currently located in Harvard’s Fogg Museum in Cambridge. According to the Harvard Art Museum, the original painting was painted in 1750 for Pompadour’s brother, Abel-François Poisson, but after being damaged the portrait was touched up again by Boucher until 1758, which is the last date stamped in the painting. The Boucher painting depicts Madame de Pompadour seated in front of her toilette and here we see her practicing the application of cosmetics. Madame Pompadour has her body shifted towards the artist and faces forward, looking directly towards the viewers (3). In one hand we see her holding a small brush that seems to have some rouge already on it from the rouge palette that she is holding with her other hand, this giving the impression that she has just applied it to her rosy pink cheeks. Her rosy cheeks were also a symbol Madame Pompadour wore proudly as a mark of her social success (5). As mentioned before, female figures were depicted to have very white powdered skin as a representation of purity, which on the table of her toilette there is a big puffy white brush sitting in the powder box behind her mirror that may have been used to apply the white powder (1). The vibrant color of her rosy cheeks, contrast the “whiteness” of her skin. Louis XV also happens to make an appearance in the portrait in Pompadours bracelet displaying the side profile of him. Her gown seems to be this puffy white and pink dress and a white drape going over her shoulders, like a superhero cape, being held by a big pink ribbon (3). Her hair is done up, powdered, and decorated with small blue flowers. Her face shows no flaws whatsoever due to the cosmetics applied by her and the face-paint later added by the artist. Boucher represented Madame Pompadour as a youthful beauty at her toilette. But, because of this youthful depiction, there were many who criticized the artwork. The use of cosmetics and face-paint in portraiture wasn’t always accepted before and during the 18th century. Besides cosmetic products containing toxic ingredients such as lead, mercury, and arsenic, the more important reason as to why cosmetics were disapproved in portraits by critics was because they felt it masked the truth. Critics would’ve preferred seeing the natural beauty of public figures instead of feeling unease knowing that cosmetics could be used to misrepresent age, class, gender, and even race (5). Portrait painters were heavily criticized and called deceivers of beauty. Boucher’s painting of Madame Pompadour received a lot of criticism because it deceived the realities of Pompadour. She was 37 when the painting was done and suffered from seizures, fevers, heart problems, and other illnesses (1). Her skin was not white and powdery like in the painting but wrinkly and dry. But, in paintings, such as this one, viewers wouldn’t be able to tell that her health wasn’t well and critics from the Salon of 1757 believe that Boucher tried to divert the attention away from her flaws in order to capture the attention of viewers. Despite the use of face-paint in paintings deceiving the viewer, it was still an artificial form of beautifying the female figure because she had an expected image to save. One artist and female French figure who in a way revolted against the beauty standards of the 18th century was Marie Antoinette’s portrait painted by Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun. The oil on canvas “Marie Antoinette in a Chemise Dress” was finished in 1783. Unfortunately, like Boucher, Vigee Le Brun received criticism for the way he depicted Marie Antoinette. Her image as a Queen was as important as, if not more than, Madame Pompadour and as part of the royal family she had to fulfill the expectation of beauty to present to the public. Cosmetics and face-paint was one way that artificial beauty enhanced in portraiture works, but another was through hair. There were many different types of extraordinary hairstyles and wigs that were worn by both men and women in the 18th century in France. Special guilds (Figure 4) were created and built to construct all kinds of wigs of hairstyles that varied in height, design, and decoration. For Marie Antoinette, her hairstyle functions as an element of her French identity and this tradition was established long before her reign (2). In another painting also done by Vigée Le Brun in 1983 depicting Marie, Marie-Antoinette ("a la rose") (Figure 3), we can see Marie Antoinette’s hair done in one of the more extraordinary hairstyles, her dress is much puffier, a bit more revealing in the breast area, and more vibrant in color, like a turquoise blue. In contrast, in the paiting, Marie Antoinette in a Chemise Dress, Vigée Le-Brun and Marie Antoinette were criticized because of the completely different depiction of Marie Antoinette. In this painting her hair is down and lacks the extravagant height, she instead goes with a flappy brown hair with a gray ribbon tied around it and a fluffy gray feather coming out from the side. Her dress is also a much simpler muslin dress (4), less revealing, white, and with a kind of dark gold colored ribbon around her waist. One comparison that both Vigée Le Brun have in common is that in both Marie Antoinette is holding and displaying a flower. Marie Antoinette also disregards the beauty standards she was expected to hold by having less makeup and face paint. Like Madame Pompadour, Marie Antoinette does have the rosy cheeks, but it seems as though she is lacking white powder in her face and hair, which is why her cheeks aren’t as vibrant as Pompadour’s. Being that Marie Antoinette was a Queen, viewers and the public did not appreciate her being presented as in casual attire rather than in a formal one. As we see, the 18th century French viewers and public held beauty standards and expectations for female public figure, Madame Pompadour and Marie Antoinette. Beauty in paintings were depicted in the form of cosmetics, face-paint, hair, and even clothing. Unfortunately, for both female figures, critics did not approve of the beauty being depicted in neither Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, Marquise de Pompadour done by Boucher nor Marie Antoinette in a Chemise Dress done by Vigée Le Brun. Madame Pompadour was criticized for having too much face paint and cosmetics in her painting, yet when Marie Antoinette goes more natural in her painting by Vigée Le Brun, critics still don’t approve. These unrealistic beauty standards makes it impossible to please everyone. References:
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