Music-Loving Napoleon

#93033     48” X 36”      oc

• David: “Napoleon in His Studio”
• Renoir: “Girls at the Piano” (1892)
• Monet: “Two Haystacks” (1891)
• Still Life a la Bonnard.

Not satisfied with just building an Empire, Bonaparte embellished it. He liked to make Paris the Center of Europe.

On his embarkation to conquer Egypt, he invited 100 artists, scientists and linguists to accompany him. He used to amass, by force or not, a lot of booty back to France among them paintings, sculptures and even monuments. He honored artists, visited Salons and Expositions, ordered commission, went to David’s studio to admire his “Coronation”, inspected architectures, presided at the erection of public institutes, theaters, schools and libraries, places and fountains, gardens and canals, and specially made the Tulerie and the Louvre the attraction of the world.

His Imperial Guard looked heroic and magnificent, his court, luxury and dazzling. Ceremonies and feasts were manifestation of color and music. Indeed, Napoleon’s France was an energetic era of creation and activity.

Only one thing regrettable to him: the infertility of Empress Jocephine which resulted in a “dutiful” divorce. Napoleon did have a son, the “King of Rome”, with Marie-Louise, the new Empress. Yet how he desired to have more, two daughters for example.

In T. F. Chen’s painting, Napoleon was standing by a piano as two young ladies were playing. Are they his “Princesses”? On the wall we recognize an artwork by Monet: “Two Haystacks”.

According to the art history of the Impressionism, Monet and Renoir used to paint “en plein air”, side by side, at the Grenouillere and Argenteuil in the 1870s. But in 1892 while Renoir painted the two Parisians at the piano, Monet had already left Paris to paint haystacks. But, as suggested by T. F. Chen’s post-modern painting of this, both artworks are collected by Napoleon, the greatest art patron of France!!

– T. F. Chen