Hi folks
I just bought an amazingly sumptuous book, which is the catalogue to a travelling exhibition, entitled Napoleon, The Imperial Household. I've posted a brief illustrated review of it on one of my blogs:
sebpalmer.com/blog/?p=1477
The book and exhibition focus on the Court of the Emporer, in effect, and the material covers everything from art, architecture and design, commissioned by Napoleon and his entourage, to his birdcage from St. Helena.
It's both fascinating and exquisitely gorgeous, with hundreds of very crisp colourful photographic reproductions of everything from Sevres porcelain and Gobelin tapestries to design for wallpaper, portraits of various bigwigs, and pictures of paintings and palaces.
It is, quite literally, a treasure trove.
It's fascinating seeing how a post Revolutionary leader seeks to use all sorts of people and techniques to create and shore up their own dynastic 'legitimacy'.
I'm also currently reading Albert Speer's Inside The Third Reich. Speer's grandiose architectural works are pretty much all erased from history, except for some drawings, some photos of models, and one or two small bits of ruined architecture.
Even if his Empire didn't last all that much longer than the one Hitler attempted to create, Napoleon's legacy has enjoyed a much longer and more celebrated afterlife, from the many cities and town that bear his imprint in terms of civil work and architecture, to the way in which his Code Napoleon has lived on in European law.
This amazing show will tour Canada, the US, and finally arrive in France. We in 'perfidious Albion' will have to either content ourselves with this book, or make a trip further afield. I'm planning to go see the show at Musée Fontainebleau!