Enlightenment turned into form
Jean-Antoine Houdon’s sculptures in Gotha
His works can be found in the most important museums in the world, such as the Louvre in Paris, the Liebighaus in Frankfurt and the Hermitage in St Petersburg. However, the largest collection of Jean-Antoine Houdon’s early work can be found in the Ducal Museum in Gotha.
Jean-Antoine Houdon (1741-1828) made a name for himself in Paris at the end of the 18th century with his statues and portrait busts and soon became the most important portrait sculptor in France. Houdon introduced the ideas and values of the Enlightenment into sculpture and promoted them through artistic means. His works are characterised by the fact that they convey the image of a saint, a goddess or a philosopher without the need to recognise the attributes attached to them. Nor do his statues tell stories or mark their climax. The content they convey is to be found solely in their posture and naturalness. He thus fulfils the contemporary demand for comprehensibility through empathy.
Houdon’s portraits were no longer primarily representative, but tended towards a veristic art more committed to the subject. Houdon mainly portrayed bourgeois patrons, French and American Enlightenment figures, but also rulers such as Catherine II, Louis XVI and Napoleon I, as well as members of the French court. In his portrait busts, Houdon emphasised the expressive facial expressions of his sitters, so that the viewer could grasp the character and significance of the person less through knowledge than through empathetic vision.
Ernst II of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg met Houdon during his cavalier tour in Paris. A close, almost friendly relationship developed between the duke and the artist, to which Gotha owes the largest and most fascinating collection of works by the French sculptor outside of France.
Denis Diderot, 1771
Diderot was an important voice in the discourse on art theory and inspired artists such as Jean-Antoine Houdon and Jean-Baptiste Greuze to search for modern forms of expression. He rejected the art genre of allegory, which was particularly popular in the Baroque period, with its diverse symbolism, and demanded that a picture should not pose any riddles to the viewer. The artist should be able to convey the content to the viewer without having to resort to literary background knowledge. Works of art should appeal to the emotions, not the intellect.
In this bust without clothes and wig, the writer is heroised as an ancient thinker who argues with an alert gaze and slightly open mouth.
Muscleman, 1767
Houdon’s search for truth, modern symbols and expressive possibilities is particularly evident in some of his works. Even in his early works, Houdon was in tune with the spirit of the times, even in his depiction of traditional themes. In 1766, the young sculptor was commissioned to create two statues: “St John the Baptist” and “St Bruno”. In order to depict the body of St John in an anatomically correct way, Houdon first created a life-size “muscle man”. This was considered by contemporaries to be the best anatomical statue that had been created up to that point. Among other things, it served as a teaching aid for anatomical studies. The great importance that Houdon attached to the anatomically correct reproduction of his statues and portraits meant that he subsequently frequently used death and life masks for portraits. As late as 1794, Houdon stated: “… I can say that there are really only two things with which I have occupied myself all my life […]: anatomy and the moulding of statues”.
Saint Bruno, 1766/67
The statue of St Bruno, which Houdon created in 1766/67 for the Roman church of Sante Maria degli Angeli, caused a sensation: Wrapped in a robe with only a few simple folds, his arms crossed in front of his chest, the saint bows his bald head as if absorbed in deep thought. By dispensing with any narrative accessories and attributes, the sculptor, according to contemporaries, illustrates the rules of the hermit order: meditation, seclusion, humility and silence.
Morpheus, 1769
Morpheus is the god of dreams in Greek mythology. He is the son of Hypnos, the god of sleep. Morpheus can transform himself into any shape and appear in dreams. He mainly sends his dreams to kings and rulers. He delivers the messages of the gods. His bed is made of ivory and is located in a dark cave. The cave of his father Hypnos or the part of the underworld called Erebos is also mentioned as his place of residence.
The Gotha plaster sculpture is the only surviving cast. A marble version of this sculpture can be found in the Louvre in Paris.
Christoph Willibald Gluck, 1775
In the Salon of 1775, Houdon exhibited a plaster bust of Gluck. The sculptor kept a close eye on which personalities were currently in fashion and of whom he could produce and distribute portraits. In 1775, Houdon had not yet established himself as a portraitist of the intellectuals and artists of the Enlightenment. At that time, he had only painted portraits of Diderot, which had attracted attention at the Salon. Gluck, who celebrated triumphant successes in Paris and introduced important musical innovations to France, was an attractive model for Houdon.
He created a grandiose composition. He had the bust reach down to the waist, creating a half-portrait of the composer with only the stumps of his arms. The monumental impression created by the size of the bust was emphasised by the height of the plinth and the base plate. He dressed Gluck “à la française” with an open shirt collar and dishevelled hair, which corresponds to the traditional portrayal of the artist. Houdon faithfully reproduced Gluck’s pockmarked face. However, this was not to the general taste and was criticised in the Salon.
The art historian Willibald Sauerländer wrote in 2002: “More radically than the face of the philosopher, this bust of a musician demonstrates how Houdon’s verism shatters the social and taste conventions of the Ancient Régime and reveals the face of the free, natural man with his fire, his passion, but also in his ugliness and his disfigurement through scars.”
The way Houdon has designed the surface structure of the jacket is also striking. The lines cut deep into the material, which are reflected in the hair, suggest a passionate, almost brutal treatment of the material. Together with the ruthlessly rendered scars, they convey the image of a truly passionate artist who goes to the limits of what is bearable for his art.
Diana, 1776
Houdon’s famous sculpture of Diana shows the goddess in full stride, with her weight resting only on the tip of her left foot. Her right leg is raised straight off the ground, Diana holds an arrow in her right hand, which is stretched forwards, and a bow in the other. Her gaze wanders into the distance, her curly hair is pinned up on top of her head. Her elegant pose gives the sculpture a floating appearance, while the majestic forms lend her a solemn, majestic expression. The weapons and the crescent in her hair identify her as the goddess Diana.
The beauty of her body was admired by her contemporaries. “The perfection of her unearthly beauty and the clarity of her form” were praised. However, focussing on a completely naked female figure was daring. Friedrich Melchior Baron von Grimm, Privy Councillor of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg, wrote in a letter to the Duke: “Diana has all the feminine charms, but does not seem to be aware of them and is always shown walking or running, looking forwards into the distance […]. She always looks like a virgin. […] Her waist is narrower and slimmer than that of Juno or Athena”. Grimm cites ancient gems and coins as well as statements by Johann Joachim Winckelmann, the famous art writer dedicated to antiquity, as evidence that the depiction of a naked Diana was already known in antiquity. In the end, Grimm came to the conclusion that there was no contradiction between her nudity and her chastity. The organisers of the Salon decided otherwise: only the bust of Diana was allowed to be shown in the Salon of 1777, but not the original large plaster model – which is now in the Ducal Museum at Friedenstein Castle in Gotha.
Voltaire, 1778
Voltaire probably sat for Houdon’s portrait in April 1778. In his Correspondance littéraire, Friedrich-Melchior Baron von Grimm wrote in May 1778: “Houdon only needed two or three sittings to achieve a success that is beyond words. Of all the thousands of portraits that have been made of Voltaire over the last sixty years, this was the only one with which he himself was completely satisfied. Never have these features been rendered with so much grace. All the forms of his countenance are perfectly faithful and without a shadow of burden. It is all fire, all subtlety, the whole essence of his physiognomy is captured in the most endearing and attractive moment imaginable.” According to Grimm, this portrait was the only one with which Voltaire himself was “completely satisfied”.
The focus on the head has the strongest effect in this type of bust. Here, Houdon combines the idealisation of the sitter, which goes back to ancient portrait busts, with a lively, almost expressive characterisation.
These facial features can also be found with marginal changes in other portrait forms, for example in the bust “à l’antique”, in which the sitter is dressed in an antique cloak. Houdon responded to the wishes of his buyers with the different garments.