François Boucher and the L’Odalisque brune: Revelations concerning the unknown origins of a secret and libertine work
A curatorial lecture by Guillaume Faroult
This event is free and open to the public. Please join us for a reception following the talk.
The painter François Boucher (1703–1770) is known for an artistic career that was arguably one of most brilliant of the European Enlightenment. Called upon not only by the French court but also by many foreign governments, Boucher’s artistic imagination provided many models and images that inspired artists throughout Europe. In 1765, he was named The First Painter of the King and thereby became the Director of the French Academy of Painting and Sculpture. During this same year, a highly suggestive engraving surfaced which allowed the French public to gain a glimpse of one of his most daringly erotic works, L’Odalisque brune. Indeed, this work was part of a secret corpus of paintings for which libertine collectors clamoured throughout the Century. Painted in 1745 for a discrete connoisseur, this work by Boucher characterises a century at once filled with curiosity for all things related to freedom and liberty and possessing a voracious appetite for moral licentiousness. The lecture will attempt to retrace the genesis of this painting at the same time as it uncovers the many meanings and functions belonging to a highly original work. Its combination of seduction and ambiguity underscores that remarkable taste for masks and oriental fantasies that typifies the French Enlightenment.
Guillaume Faroult is senior curator of the Louvre Museum in charge of French paintings from the 18th century as well as British and American art. Specialising in French and British painting spanning the 18th century until the early 19th, he has published numerous books and articles on this period. His interests lie more specifically in the historical reception of art, the practices of art collectors, the relationship between art and literature and in studying the history of artistic institutions such as museums. Faroult has curated many exhibitions, including La Caze Collection (Paris, Louvre and London, Wallace Collection, 2007–2008), Turner and the Masters (London, Tate Britain; Paris, Grand Palais; Madrid, Prado, 2009–2010), Antiquity Revived: Neoclassical Art in the Eighteenth Century (Paris, Louvre and Houston, Museum of Fine Arts, 2010–2011), Fragonard amoureux. Galant et libertin (Paris, Luxembourg Museum, 2015–2016) and Hubert Robert (Paris, Louvre and Washington, National Gallery of Art, 2016). For 2020, he is curating two exhibitions of British painting to be held in the Museum of Fine Art in Bordeaux, France.
Presented by the Department of Art History, Visual Art and Theory; Department of French, Hispanic and Italian Studies; and the Consulate General of France in Vancouver
