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Micheline's Blog

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Micheline's Blog

Tag Archives: Rococo

The Last few Days

04 Sunday Aug 2013

Posted by michelinewalker in Sharing

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, François Boucher, Haydn, Managing CFS, Rococo, teaching

woman-s-head[1]
Woman’s Head, by François Boucher (c. 1750)
François Boucher (29 September 1703 – 30 May 1770)
Rococo artist
 

Dear Readers,

For the last few days, I have not been well.  So it has been impossible for me to write posts.  There have been perturbing events in my life and these have triggered a rather severe episode of fatigue.  In 1976, I caught a flu from which I never fully recovered.  It was the onset of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.  Most of the time, I can manage this limitation sufficiently to write blogs and, if not assigned an unreasonable workload, it did not prevent me from being a productive university teacher.  However, I did not have much of a social life.  There wasn’t enough time.

My students often told me that I was the only professor who realized my course was not the only course they took.  Obviously, I was pacing myself, which turned out to be helpful to my students.  I also prepared my classes long before I taught them so I would always be ready.  Would that I could have made better use of the internet.  During the years I taught, the internet was not what it has become.

I always taught at least one language course and invited students to do the exercises contained in their textbook so I could tell whether or not they had understood.  I did not give them a grade for these exercises, because it was practice.  All were corrected and returned the next time I saw them.  It was useful feedback and a form of communication with each student.  Students who did not understand received private tutoring.

Yesterday, I started writing a blog on “Cupid and Psyche,” a “digression” in Apuleius‘ Golden Ass, but I could not finish it.  It will have to be more concise.

Love to all of you.

Micheline

Joseph Haydn (31 March 1732 – 31 May 1809)
“String Quartet for Strings“
head-of-a-woman-from-behindMicheline Walker
4 August 2013 
WordPress
 
 
 
Head of a Woman from Behind
François Boucher
(Please click on the image to enlarge it.)

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A Glimpse at the Art of François Boucher

21 Saturday Jul 2012

Posted by michelinewalker in Art

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

Antoine Watteau, Boucher, Encyclopædia Britannica, François Boucher, French Revolution, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Jacques-Louis David, Peter Paul Rubens, Rococo, Wikipedia

La Toilette by François Boucher
Photo credit: La Toilette
François Boucher: 1703 – 1770 Rococo
Video: the music is by Haydn
 

François Boucher (29 September 1703 – 30 May 1770) “was a French painter, a proponent of Rococo taste, known for his idyllic and voluptuous paintings on classical themes, decorative allegories representing the arts or pastoral occupations, intended as a sort of two-dimensional furniture. He also painted several portraits of his illustrious patroness, Louis XV’s official mistress, Madame de Pompadour.” (Wikipedia)

The son of an artist, François Boucher won the prestigious Prix de Rome in 1723.  He was influenced by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo and Peter Paul Rubens.  On his return from Rome, he did engravings of drawings by Antoine Watteau.  Later, “[a]fter illustrating an edition of Molière’s works, he drew cartoons of farmyard scenes and chinoiserie for the Beauvais tapestry factory.”[i]

News of his talents quickly reached Versailles.  He worked for the queen and for Mme de Pompadour, the chief mistress of Louis XV and Boucher’s friend and patron. “He became a member of the Royal Academy in 1734 and then became the principal producer of designs for the royal porcelain factories, as well as director of the Gobelins tapestry factory. In 1765 he became director of the Royal Academy and held the title of first painter to King Louis XV.”[ii] 

Madame de Pompadour by François Boucher (please click on the picture to enlarge it)

Rococo art, decoration and architecture are characterized by movement. It is a busy and often features a profusion of fabrics.  It followed the baroque, a more restrained style.  Rococo æsthetics is in fact an extreme that called for a return to sober depictions and more serious contents that would reflect the intellectual endeavour of the Encyclopédistes.  For instance, although Jacques-Louis David was a student of François Boucher, he is a neoclassicist.  As for Boucher, his art typifies the lightheartedness that preceded the French Revolution.  We see opulence and hear laughter, but a storm is approaching.  In this regard, Boucher’s art resembles that of Antoine Watteau (1684 – 1721) and Jean-Honoré Fragonard 1732 – 1806).

Related blogs:
Resilience: from the French Revolution to the Interstate Highway System
Peter Paul Rubens (28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640)
_________________________
[i] “François Boucher.” Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2012. Web. 20 Jul. 2012. <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/75367/Francois-Boucher>.
[ii] Ibid.
 
© Micheline Walker
20 July 2012
WordPress
 
45.408358 -71.934658

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