The World of Interiors

COSTUME DRAMATIST

Top: a matron reclines about to sip the çay (tea) that her maid has brought her (c17 4 0- 4 2). Liotard’s skill in using black and red chalks to

convey the pattern and texture of different fabrics is supremely evident. Above: doubt surrounds the identity of this sitter said to be Grand

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HE LOOKS to the left his head and shoulders seen

in profile within a small oval frame for all the world like a Ren-

aissance commemorative medal. Yet this is no 15th-century

Italian potentate fashioned in bronze but an 18th-century Swiss

artist Jean-Etienne Liotard (1702-89) – a self-portrait painted

in glowing enamels. Silhouetted against

a white background he wears a crimson-

red gown and a slightly darker felt cap a

contrast to the softer greying wisps of his

hair and long beard. The effect is startling

especially given its small size pulling him

out from the confines of the elliptical bor-

der to transmit an almost tactile presence.

Painted in mid-career in the medium in

which he had first trained this is the image

Liotard seems to have chosen to launch his

entry into the London art scene in 1753. His

adoption of the unconventional ‘Oriental’

garb was at least in part a self-promotional

ploy – although one gets the strong impres-

sion that he enjoyed wearing the sumptu-

ous loose-fitting robes and the distinctive

felt or fur caps. He had already garnered a

reputation as an ‘exotic’ individual on the

strength of earlier similar portrayals: one painted in 1744 had

been acquired for the collection of artists’ self-portraits assem-

bled by the grand dukes of Tuscany at the Uffizi in Florence. By

then travellers to the eastern Mediter ranean had fostered British

interest in the culture of the Ottoman empire helping to fuel the

Rococo craze for turquerie. Liotard exploit-

ed the burgeoning fashion for dressing à la

turque to the full – not exactly Turkish in

fact but a mix of costumes including some

from Mold avia then under Ottoman rule.

No less a personage than the connois-

seur and aesthete Horace Wal pole was duly

fascinated even as he was acutely aware of

Liotard’s brazen self-promotion. ‘From

having lived at Con stant inople he wears

a Turkish habit and a beard down to his

girdle... This and his extravagant prices

which he has raised even beyond what he

asked at Paris will probably get him as much

money as he covets for he is avaricious

beyond imagination.’ Amusingly Walpole

found the exquisite enamel so compelling

that he overcame his scruples and acquired

it for his own collection. r

PREVIOUS PAGES: MUSEE DU LOUVRE PARIS. PHOTO © RMN-GRAND PALAIS (MUSEE DU LOUVRE)/FRANCK RAUX. THIS PAGE TOP: MUSEUM OSKAR REINHART WINTERTHUR. PHOTO SIK-ISEA/PHILIPP HITZ. BOTTOM: NATIONAL GALLERY LONDON