Régence

Regency (French " Regency " ) refers to both a short political period in France as well as the art style the same time. The former refers to the years 1715-1723, in which the regent Philippe d'Orléans during the minority of King Louis XV. the government in France initiated. The art style includes approximately the years 1715-1730 and thinks an early form of the Rococo.

Policy

When Louis XIV died in 1715, a 54 -year-old absolutist rule came to an end, France had dominated both politically and culturally strong. Even before his death, he had his nephew, Philip of Orléans, testamentary transfer the governance for the time in which his great-grandson Louis XV. was not yet of age. Upon the death of Louis XIV, France was the most powerful state and cultural center of Europe. On the other hand, had approached broken with a new king also the time for new directions in politics and culture.

Philippe of Orléans used in comparison to his uncle a more open, but also weaker style of government: He promoted the Parliaments', was against censorship and ordered the new edition of books that had been banned under the rule of his uncle. He also promoted the visual arts and was himself a great connoisseur. He was also known for debauchery on his lush festivals, which he held in his court at the Palais Royal in Paris.

He followed the political rethinking of his uncle, by he entered an alliance with Great Britain, Austria and the Netherlands, but led a successful war against the Bourbon Spain, who created the conditions for a European peace. Between 1716 and 1720 he tried, with the financial system of the Scottish economist John Law to reduce the enormous national debt, but this failed and resulted in the first major financial and speculative crises.

Art style

Since Philip of Orléans saw no reason to move his center of life in the Palace of Versailles, where his uncle had resided, that aristocratic families that Louis XIV had been close, but does not want to go to the court of Philip of Orléans, they sought for a balance, which they found in privacy. Many returned to Paris back and withdrew to their country seats. At Salon evenings they met writers, poets and philosophers, played music and sought mental stimulation as well as elegant distraction. Intimate subjects and fine colors, such as Antoine Watteau, as well as his teacher Claude Audran, enjoyed great popularity. Both made the floral tendrils wave forms and motifs popular that should be influential for the later Rococo. The artisans Thomas Germain and Gilles -Marie Oppenord, the latter pattern designer of the Regent, were influenced in their work by northern Italian asymmetric and irregular cartridges. The imaginative ornamental prints Jean Bérains that were partially inspired by a grotesque Renaissance, also influenced the entire decorative arts, not only in France but also in England and much of northern Europe.

The attitude of the nobility according to the Regency style is mainly used in interior decoration and furniture design; the exterior of the building long remained heavily influenced by the 17th century.

By cabinetmaker André- Charles Boulle new pieces of furniture became popular, such as the flat desk ( bureau plat ), the dresser and the low bookcase or the Cabinet (Bas armoire ). In general, the tables were smaller, finer and easier to handle. Console were important and were integrated into the interior decoration, such as by being placed under a mirror and corresponded with the forms. The shapes and designs of the furniture were directed increasingly according to their function: luxuriant for representative rooms, simple and small for private rooms. For women, a new kind of small toilet or ladies desk ( Bonheur du jour ) was born. There are chairs popular, so-called voyeuses or ponteuses on which you sat astride to watch other participants in the game room or in the conversation.

As materials exotic woods from Asia and Africa came on, who were shipped from the colonies, such as satinwood, Indian rosewood or amaranth wood. As ornaments were female masks, monkeys, mussels and bat wings popular, and palmettes, sunflower and acanthus leaves. Backgrounds were often checkered or decorated with lozenges. Also, chinoiserie, which should be even more important in Rococo were already represented.

In the field of silverwork of the Regency especially the goldsmith Juste Aurèle Meissonier - became famous, who managed in his innovative designs again and again to find the perfect balance between asymmetry, dynamics and tension.