Edme Bouchardon – the favorite artist of Louis XV and the most famous representative of the family dynasty of French sculptors

Edme Bouchardon (May 29, 1698 – July 27, 1762) – a famous French artist of the 18th century, an outstanding sculptor who worked in the neoclassical style. He was also a skilled minter of coins and a draftsman, all his life he enjoyed the special patronage of King Louis XV. The work of the brilliant master was highly valued by his contemporaries, he was an adherent and active popularizer of the traditions of ancient art. In the biography of the genius there are many interesting facts that deserve attention.

Biography

Edme Bouchardon was born in France into a large family. He was taught the basics of sculptural art by his father, who from childhood introduced his sons to work in his workshop. Then Edme became a student of the famous master Guillaume Coustou the Elder, under whose guidance he graduated from the Royal Academy of Arts and became a laureate of the Rome Prize.

Edme immediately took advantage of the opportunity and in 1722 left for Italy, where he lived for the next 10 years. During this time, he not only honed his skills to perfection, but also acquired influential patrons, including the support of Pope Benedict XIII.

Bouchardon was not a supporter of the Rococo style that was dominant in European art at that time; for him, the ideal of beauty was the works of ancient masters. While in Rome, Edme was enthusiastically engaged in making copies of ancient sculptures, and also made busts of wealthy customers.

Upon his return to France, the master quickly achieved wide recognition. In 1737, at the annual salon, a number of mythological sculptures created by Edme Bouchardon were enthusiastically received by the public and critics. The French monarch Louis XV also sincerely admired the work of the sculptor and offered him a well-paid position as the head of the art workshops of the Palace of Versailles.

The artist’s main task was to make marble statues for the vast parks adjacent to the king’s country residence.

To speed up the work, Edme took on two younger brothers as assistants and over the next two decades created dozens of original sculptural compositions.

In parallel with his main work in the royal workshops, Edme Bouchardon managed to sculpt for wealthy customers and take part in annual art salons. Already in the mid-1740s, he gained fame as one of the best masters of art in France, received the title of academician and even a lifelong pension from the Parisians for creating the famous Fountain of the Four Seasons.

Bouchardon was always interested in graphics.

He was one of the best drawing masters of his era and left many beautiful works in sanguine and red chalk to his descendants. Many of his graphic works became the artistic basis for the creation of engravings and book illustrations after the master’s death.

Another honorable duty of Edmé Bouchardon was the production of royal award tokens, which the monarch distributed to his subjects on special occasions. The artist drew sketches, and on their basis, master minters made commemorative coins from silver and gold, for which collectors today pay huge amounts of money.

In the early 1750s, the sculptor received a personal order from the king to make an equestrian statue of Louis XV to commemorate France’s victory in the War of the Austrian Succession. Work on the monument dragged on for many years and was completed after the author’s death by Jean-Baptiste Pigalle. But the grandiose monument did not stand for long on the Place de la Concorde in Paris; it was destroyed in 1789 during the French Revolution.

Until the end of his days, the brilliant sculptor basked in the rays of glory and was showered with royal favors.