French Decorative and Applied Art from the late 17th and early-mid 18th centuries

This room is dedicated to French applied art from the late 17th and early-mid 18th centuries. The tapestries based on cartoons by Charles Le Brun (1619-1690) from the series The Royal Households - May. St-Germain. The King Riding with the Ladies of the Court and October. The Tuileries Palace. The King’s Walk - belong to the “grand style” of the era of Louis XIV. After the death of the Sun King in 1715 the Rococo style began to establish itself in French art. Architects began to develop the idea of an urban mansion-hotel with modest but elegant accommodations. The walls were decorated primarily with carved wooden panels. In this room one can see the oak veneer covering the walls, as well as painted overdoors. This desk-bureau, often referred to as a Bureau Mazarin, is inlaid with an ornament consisting of two engravings by the renowned ornamental artist Jean Berain (1640-1711). The armchair in the center of the room comes from a set commissioned by Louis XV’s daughter Marie Louise Élisabeth, the Duchess of Parma. The ornament embordered with gilded silver on the seat and back corresponds to the chair’s decorative carvings. The French faience on display in this room comes from the workshops of Rouen and Moustier*. The expansion of France’s production of faience was stimulated in part by edicts calling for the melting of silver in 1689, 1699, and 1709. One example of decorative ceramic sculpture here is the bust depicting Winter as an old man sculpted in a broad and grandiose manner. Works manufactured in Saint-Cloud were the first examples of “soft-paste” porcelain in France.