Visual Culture- Visual Language and Emotion

Today's lecture was on The Eighteenth Century Fantasy between 1715-1760, it looked closely into styles such as Rococo and Chinoiserie and the French culture at the time. It started in 1715 with the death of Louis XIV and his infant son Louis XV been crowned the new king, until he reached an age where he could rule the country, he was taught and raised to be king. During this time France was close to been on the brink of bankruptcy. The Baroque style began to decline and was replaced with Rococo, this style expressed emotion rather than power. There is a common symbol that occurs throughout Rococo which is the Rocaille which symbolises water flowing over rocks and can be seen on a lot of furniture in this period. The obsession with nature and love was clearly displayed in this style and heavily featured this surge of emotion that was always expressed in this style. You can see this style in paintings a lot with bright colours and images of frolicking (sex is usually indicated or implied) an example of this would be The Swing- Fragonard 1766.

Madame de Pompadour was an impactful character during these times and was groomed to be the mistress to the King of France, this led to her been one of the most powerful women in France at the time but she was later rejected by the king when she started to age and lose her youth and beauty. The paintings and images of her always showed her clutching or wearing an open rose, this was to celebrate the French culture and beauty. Unfortunately her beauty disappears from art as she began to age and instead of been the King's mistress, she became the King's confident based on the friendship and trust they had built.

The fantasy of romance echoed throughout literature, paintings and clothes. The males dressed flamboyant to adopt a political stance whereas the females wore court dresses that were very elaborate. Both would spend hours doing make-up in the toilette, this took place two times a day. This period of France was very much about expressing love and emotion in any way possible, this became a unique style at the time and is very interesting to look back on in hindsight.