(Scott, 1995, 177).
Representations of “heroic” mythological subjects such as those in Coypel’s Aeneas series became
valued by the elite more for their picturesque appeal, their relevance to society at large or their emotive
power, than for any association with exclusive or effective power (Scott, 1995, 182, 200). On a political
level, the rococo might be seen as an indictment of absolute monarchy, defined by its general reluctance to
share power, and as a new way of negotiating social status. This led however to further tensions. Its
relatively “lowbrow” classical references were accessible not only to the disempowered nobility, but
also to “new money” (financiers, art collectors, connoisseurs) aspiring to noble status and to notions of
honnêteté (politeness, a cultivated sociability) inherited from the seventeenth century. This broadening of
social and cultural aspiration weakened the power of rococo mansions to endow a more exclusive social
status. When Louis XV assumed the throne, the continuing taste for the rococo could be seen as a symbol
of his regime’s “slack moral will” (Scott, 1995, 7, 10, 81–99, 101–117, 133–136, 177–211, 213–239).
The rococo was regarded as an even greater threat when it was accepted outside the domain of decorative
art; for example, in the work of academicians or in Salon exhibitions, where it was increasingly displayed
without reference to any original or intended decorative context (Scott, 1995, 222–260). Writers such as
JeanBernard, abbé Le Blanc (1707–1781), Cochin and FrançoisMarie Arouet (known as Voltaire;
1694–1778) echoed La Font de Saint Yenne’s antirococo sentiments. The very success of the rococo
served as a metaphor for a morally bankrupt state. By the end of the 1740s it was however in serious
decline in France (Scott, 1995, 262–264).
Burgeoning subgenres of rococo decoration sprang up in order to cater for its widening audience and
took the style well beyond the bounds of history painting. There were different trends across Europe. In
southern Germany, for example, the rococo often coexisted with the Italian baroque, its precise
character adapting to the differing characters of church and palace interiors and to local traditions
(Kaufman, 1995, 367–371). The style drew on a range of motifs including the grotesque, derived from
ancient Roman and Renaissance decorative schemes. This was an entertaining, apparently improvised and
provocative form of decoration that mixed antique motifs with more plebeian allusions to fairground and
theatrical spectacle, sometimes featuring, for example, performing monkeys and musicians. It allowed the
social elite to flirt with a transgressive street culture, yet in a safe, picturesque way (Scott, 1995, 123–
136). The arabesque, a curvilinear form of decorative pattern derived from the Renaissance and based on
foliage, urns, horns and other similar motifs, was also popular, as was use of figural motifs familiar from
the fêtes galantes devised by Watteau or the pastoral subjects of Boucher, each of which represented a
kind of safe, atadistance dalliance with nature, hence alluding (indirectly and hypothetically) to a
social paradise (Scott, 1995, 152–161). Boucher’s painted lovers, shepherds and shepherdesses often
drew attention to their own artificial dress and forms of behavior rather than claiming to serve any serious
moral purpose.
The adoption of the rococo by a broader range of nonaristocratic clients sparked its decline. If the
nobility could no longer distinguish themselves through their rococo possessions and environments, they
could at least reassert older cultural ideologies of antiquity and tradition: their knowledge of the classics
singled them out. A more austere classicism regained its position as a signifier of social distinction. In the
eighteenth century, what we now describe as the fashion for neoclassicism (discussed in the Introduction)
was often justified as a means of elevating art to its previous aesthetic and intellectual grandeur, and was
supported by an increasingly strong, international artistic community in Rome that catered for elite
cultural tourists from Europe and beyond (see Introduction; Johns, 2000, 17–40; Barroero and Susinno,
2000, 48–49, 53–58). When the École des Élèves Protégés closed in 1775 (see Chapter 1) its Director,
JosephMarie Vien (1716–1809), became Director of the French Academy in Rome, which acted as an
international hub of neoclassicism. Neoclassical artists included painters such as Anton Raffael Mengs