ganda and the value of visual imagery for cultivating a public per-
sona, and they spared no pains to raise great symbols and monu-
ments to the king’s absolute power. Louis and Colbert sought to reg-
ularize taste and establish the classical style as the preferred French
manner. The founding of the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculp-
ture in 1648 served to advance this goal.
Louis XIV maintained a workshop of artists, each with a spe-
cialization—faces, fabric, architecture, landscapes, armor, or fur.
Thus, many of the king’s portraits were a group effort, but the finest
is the work of one artist. The portrait of Louis XIV (FIG. 25-30) by
Hyacinthe Rigaud(1659–1743) successfully conveys the image of
an absolute monarch. The king, age 63 when Rigaud painted this
work, looks out at the viewer with directness. He stands with his left
hand on his hip and with his elegant ermine-lined fleur-de-lis corona-
tion robes (compare FIG. 25-3) thrown over his shoulder, suggesting
an air of haughtiness. Louis also draws his garment back to expose his
legs. (The king was a ballet dancer in his youth and was proud of his
well-toned legs.) The portrait’s majesty derives in large part from the
composition. The Sun King is the unmistakable focal point of the im-
age, and Rigaud placed him so that he seems to look down on the
viewer. Given that Louis XIV was very short in stature—only five feet,
four inches, a fact that drove him to invent the red-heeled shoes he
wears in the portrait—the artist apparently catered to his patron’s
wishes. The carefully detailed environment in which the king stands
also contributes to the painting’s stateliness and grandiosity. Indeed,
when the king was not present, Rigaud’s portrait, which hung over
the throne, served in his place, and courtiers were not permitted to
turn their backs on the painting.Architecture and Sculpture
THE LOUVREThe first great architectural project Louis XIV
and his adviser Colbert undertook was the closing of the east side of
the Louvre’s Cour Carré (FIG. 23-12), left incomplete by Pierre Lescot
in the 16th century. The king summoned Gianlorenzo Bernini, as the
most renowned architect of his day, from Rome to submit plans, but
Bernini envisioned an Italian palace on a monumental scale that
would have involved the demolition of all previous work. His plan re-
jected, Bernini indignantly returned to Rome. Louis then turned to
three French architects—Claude Perrault(1613–1688),Louis Le
Vau(1612–1670), and Charles Le Brun(1619–1690)—for the
Louvre’s east facade (FIG. 25-31). The design is a brilliant synthesis
of French and Italian classical elements, culminating in a new and
definitive formula. The facade has a central and two corner project-
ing columnar pavilions. The central pavilion is in the form of a clas-
sical temple front. To either side is a giant colonnade of paired
columns, resembling the columned flanks of a temple folded out like
wings. The whole rests on a stately podium. The designers favored an
even roofline, balustraded and broken only by the central pediment,
over the traditional French pyramidal roof of the Louvre’s west wingFrance 69725-31Claude Perrault, Louis Le Vau,and Charles Le Brun,east facade of the Louvre, Paris, France, 1667–1670.
The design of the Louvre’s east facade is a brilliant synthesis of French and Italian classical elements, including a central pavilion that resembles an
ancient temple front with a pediment.