Treasures of the Louvre Page #5

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This was brutal and necessary,

argued the likes of David

and his fellow revolutionaries.

But what was really happening was a

seismic shift in European history.

This was the moment when art

ceased to be

the preserve of the rich

and the wealthy

and was really at the service

of the people.

The new museum worked to

the revolutionary 10-day week.

The first six were reserved

for artists who were at liberty

to take paintings off walls to copy,

free to put chalk marks

on the canvases.

Then the Louvre was open

three days for the public.

With the last day

for cleaning and repairs.

And to add to the galleries

of confiscated art,

the revolutionary army was given

the order to seize new treasures

during the campaigns abroad.

On the 27th of July, 1798,

on the anniversary of the fall

of Robespierre,

an extraordinary procession

of revolutionary booty from Italy

made its way across Paris.

And it ended up here

on the Champs des Mars.

There were 80 wagons stuffed to

the gills with books, manuscripts,

rare plants and exotic animals.

And there were also lots of

paintings

from church and aristocratic

collections -

including Titian and Raphael -

whose ultimate destination

was the Louvre.

On a banner proclaimed the slogan

of the day -

"Ils sont enfin

sur une terre libre."

"At last,

they're in a free country."

Today there are works

of extraordinary beauty

for us to enjoy in the Louvre,

and all because of this

revolutionary plundering.

There are sculptures

by Michelangelo -

The Dying and The Rebellious Slaves.

They were taken

from the Vatican in Rome.

And from the Benedictine monastery

of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice,

was seized this vast canvas -

The Wedding Feast at Cana

by Veronese.

Its life-size figures

had been dominating the refectory

for over 200 years.

The painting was so big it had to be

cut into two

to make the journey by mule

across the Alps.

Vincent Delieuvin knows

the painting intimately.

THEY CONVERSE IN FRENCH

TRANSLATOR:
'When we take step back

and get a sense of the perspective,

'there are the columns reaching out

at the back, which give it amplitude,

'and, of course, there's the colour -

the greens, the blues and the reds.

'All bouncing off and complementing

each other.

'It's extraordinary.

'Across the painting, it's the

little hidden gems that I love.

'All the little details.

'There's even a musical performance

going here in the foreground.

'And there's a woman over here that's

looking straight at us,

'as if...flirting with us!

'Next to the one picking her teeth.

'All of these amusing little bits

and pieces.

'Even the slightly sterner men -

you can see this chap over here,

'who is holding himself very distant

and severe.

'Those that look like they're about

to fall asleep

'because of the alcohol.

'It's such a vibrant painting -

almost noisy, if you will.

'But in the end,

'what I find extraordinary

'is the figure smack bang

in the middle of the painting.

'This is the haloed figure of

Jesus Christ

'with the Virgin Mary by his side.

'Staring into space,

oblivious to the revelry around him.'

Perhaps the message here is simple -

all this pleasure around me

is ephemeral,

what I bring you is eternal.

By 1798, when this booty reached

Paris,

the revolutionary ardour of David,

indeed of France, had cooled.

After the fall of Robespierre,

David was arrested

and put in prison where this

self-portrait was painted.

So perhaps this gaze shows

a certain scepticism

and distaste for the rough

old trade of politics.

But if David was anything,

he was a survivor.

On his release, the painter was

ready to ride

the next wave of history.

Time to offer his talents to

the next strong man of France.

TRUMPET FANFARE:

David found himself at

the beck and call of a man

who said that he didn't know much

about art and architecture,

but he did know

exactly what it meant

when it came to

buffing up his image.

This was a man who'd been a

military hero during the Revolution.

Then after the coup d'etat

that ended the Directory,

he was the First Consul.

He was the despot who

crowned himself Emperor.

Yes, Napoleon Bonaparte.

If you visit Napoleon's Tomb

here at Les Invalides in Paris,

you can see enshrined in marble

evidence that the Louvre

was important to Napoleon.

I love this. This is the celebration

of Napoleon's public achievements,

it's, "Look upon my works,

ye tourists, and be impressed."

And either side is a list of

everything that he's achieved

as public works.

And in the centre of it is the

Travaux du Louvre, the Louvre.

Once Napoleon had absolute power

in France, he wasted little time

in using the Louvre for the

purposes of self-promotion.

The dictator ordered that

the Revolutionary Museum

now be called

the Musee Napoleon.

And he had this mini and first

Arc de Triomphe erected here

in front of the Louvre

on the Carrousel

as a monument to his martial glory.

On top were beautiful

bronze statues of horses

plundered from

St Mark's Square in Venice.

Friezes celebrated Napoleon's

many military campaigns.

And there's this inscription

dedicated to the Austrian Campaign,

and the decisive French victory

at the Battle of Austerlitz.

Napoleon put his imprint on walls

and ceilings with the letter N,

and his chosen images

of bees and eagles.

And he needed a painter to

immortalise the most sacred

moments of his life in

the most sacred spaces.

On the 18th of December 1803,

a proclamation declared,

"Nous avons nommes M David

notre premier peintre."

Much to the immense

self-satisfaction of David,

he was now "our" first painter,

and in 1804, "we"

had a job for him.

Napoleon made sure that

David, his court painter,

witnessed the moment that

he crowned himself Emperor

here in Notre Dame on

the 2nd of December 1804.

Originally, David had a

ringside view for his sketching,

but then the master of ceremonies,

an aristocrat called

Louis-Philippe de Segur,

who was very conscious

of class and rank,

moved David right up

into the galleries,

right high up where he could

neither see the procession

nor, crucially,

could he see the crowning.

When this happened,

David exploded, he went mad,

there was a fight, real fisticuffs,

and it was only after this punch-up

that David got his

rightful place back.

The rest, of course, is

art history, but, you know,

talk about an artistic temperament!

The finished work's in the Louvre,

and it's a piece of work

on a huge scale.

It's the detail that's important,

and this is what preoccupied

David and Napoleon when they

met to discuss the painting.

David captured the moment that

Napoleon crowned Josephine queen,

not his own coronation.

Her kneeling figure was copied

from Rubens'

Coronation of Marie de' Medici.

By the way, she's had

years taken off her

by David's painterly facelift.

Originally, David had painted

the Pope with his hands

folded in his lap, until the

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