Louis XV as a Roman Emperor

Louis XV as a Roman Emperor

Michel François Dandré-Bardon

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This large figure study can be connected to a lost painting, L'Ami de la paix, depicting the French king Louis XV in the garb of a Roman emperor. The drawing is primarily a study for the costume and the pose; the king’s features are only summarily indicated. Two compositional studies in ink and wash (Graphische Sammlung Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London) must have preceded our study, judging from the large scale of the figure and the level of detail. The Latin inscription on the stone refers to olive branches replacing spears. A similar costume and pose was adopted by the sculptor Jean-Baptiste Pigalle for a bronze monument commissioned in 1755 and erected in Reims in 1765. Perrin Stein (2017)

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Louis XV as a Roman EmperorLouis XV as a Roman EmperorLouis XV as a Roman EmperorLouis XV as a Roman EmperorLouis XV as a Roman Emperor

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.