The Louvre can claim something of a first with its huge exhibition on Hubert Robert, one of the most prolific artists of the 18th century.It is the first show of such magnitude devoted to the artist. The project, in collaboration with the National Gallery of Art of Washington, gathers 140 works, including paintings and drawings coming from great French and foreign heritage funds.The show illustrates the diversity of the French painter, whose creations go far beyond the representations of ruins with which he has been principally associated for centuries.Robert enjoyed an outstanding career in France during the Ancient Regime and later in the Napoleonic era.In the 1760s, he traveled in Italy with Fragonard and his protector the Abbé de Saint-Non, sketching landscapes and inspired by the scenery. At a time when fascination for Antiquity reached the highest level, he was one of the most talented and poetic creators of architectural capricci.The first part of the show gives many examples of this output : a group of drawings executed with red chalk - a technique in which he excelled – from the Museum of Valence, “The Garden of an Italian Villa” (Museum of Ottawa), or “The Cascatelles of Tivoli” exhibited in the Salon of 1769 (Museum of Pau, deposit of The Louvre).Then, the visitor can admire the talent of Robert as a decorator for big houses and castles with his large-scale canvases (see “The Fountain,” Fort Worth, Texas, Kimbell Art Museum).A section called “Le sublime et la belle horreur” (“Sublime and the Beautiful Horror”) focuses on impressive representations of fires and urban disasters, expressing the idea that everything ends with death and destruction.Having lived during the Revolution, Robert also recorded the events of his time, notably the changes in Paris (see “The Bastille in the First Days of its Demolition,” Paris, Musée Carnavalet), proving his capacity to act as a witness of history.The exhibition “Hubert Robert (1733–1808) A Visionary Painter” runs from March 9, 2016 through May 30, 2016 at the Louvre in Paris.
↧