Jean-Marie Morel (28 March 1728 – 10 August 1810), the author of ''La Théorie des Jardins'' (Paris 1776), was a trained architect and surveyor, who produced a substantial and popular work advocating the "natural" landscape style of gardening in France, a

French landscape garden The French landscape garden (french: jardin anglais, jardin à l'anglaise, jardin paysager, jardin pittoresque, jardin anglo-chinois) is a style of garden inspired by idealized romantic landscapes and the paintings of Hubert Robert, Claude Lorrai ...

. Morel never visited England to see the

English garden The English landscape garden, also called English landscape park or simply the English garden (french: Jardin à l'anglaise, it, Giardino all'inglese, german: Englischer Landschaftsgarten, pt, Jardim inglês, es, Jardín inglés), is a sty ...

style, but his book profited from the published theories of

Thomas Whately Thomas Whately (1726 – 26 May 1772), an English politician and writer, was a Member of Parliament (1761–1768), who served as Commissioner on the Board of Trade, as Secretary to the Treasury under Lord Grenville, and as Under-secretary of Stat ...

and

Claude-Henri Watelet Claude-Henri Watelet (28 August 1718 – 12 January 1786) was a rich French '' fermier-général'' who was an amateur painter, a well-respected etcher, a writer on the arts and a connoisseur of gardens. Watelet's inherited privilege of farming t ...

and from the experience he had gained from his close association with the marquis de Girardin at

Ermenonville Ermenonville () is a commune in the Oise department, northern France. Ermenonville is notable for its park named for Jean-Jacques Rousseau by René Louis de Girardin. Rousseau's tomb was designed by the painter Hubert Robert, and sits on the Isl ...

. Girondin's own ''De la Composition des paysages'' appeared in 1777.

History

Morel was chief architect to the

Princes of Conti The title of Prince of Conti (French: ''prince de Conti'') was a French noble title, assumed by a cadet branch of the princely house of Bourbon-Condé. History The title derives its name from Conty, a small town in northern France, c. 35 km ...

from as early as 1765. John Harris has identified Mme de Boufflers, the mistress and hostess of Louis-François de Bourbon, prince de Conti (1717–76), the friend and support of

Rousseau Jean-Jacques Rousseau (, ; 28 June 1712 – 2 July 1778) was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer. His political philosophy influenced the progress of the Age of Enlightenment throughout Europe, as well as aspects of the French Revolu ...

and the first woman of fashion to open her salon to foreigners, as the first French gardener in a landscape style that genuinely could be called "Brownian", that is, reflective of the style of

Lancelot "Capability" Brown Lancelot Brown (born c. 1715–16, baptised 30 August 1716 – 6 February 1783), more commonly known as Capability Brown, was an English gardener and landscape architect, who remains the most famous figure in the history of the English la ...

. On her return from England in 1765, she immediately grassed over her gardens, both at the Hôtel Saint-Simon in the ''

Temple A temple (from the Latin ) is a building reserved for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. Religions which erect temples include Christianity (whose temples are typically called churches), Hinduism (whose temples ...

'', Paris and then at the house at Auteuil, which she acquired in 1773. The results— "begotten by her on an English gardener" Horace Walpole remarked— which were a revelation to all Paris, must have been deeply impressive to the Conti architect, Morel.

Ermenonville

Morel was the architect in charge at Ermenonville from the mid-1760s. He enjoyed a long career that was focused almost entirely on garden design. He worked on some four dozen parks and gardens, including

Guiscard Guiscard () is a commune in the Oise department in northern France. See also *Communes of the Oise department The following is a list of the 679 communes of the Oise department of France. The communes cooperate in the following intercommu ...

, Arcelot, Couternon, Ermenonville,

Casson Cassons or Casson is the name of a Yokuts people, Yokuts Native American tribe in central eastern California. The Cassons are also called the Gashowu. The Casson Yokuts territory extended from the eastern side of San Joaquin Valley floor eastward ...

Launay Launay () is a commune in the Eure department in Normandy in northern France. Population See also *Communes of the Eure department The following is a list of the 585 communes of the Eure department of France. The communes cooperate in t ...

and

La Malmaison La Malmaison () is a Communes of France, commune in the Aisne Departments of France, department in Hauts-de-France in northern France. Population See also * Communes of the Aisne department * Battle of La Malmaison References

C ...

. His popular treatise offers extensive descriptions of Guiscard and Ermenonville, as illustrative examples. Where we have documentation, as at Ermenonville, it appears that Morel claims more credit for its design than is due. Of all French gardeners of the picturesque school, he stood furthest from the fashionable and decorative Anglo-chinois aspects of garden design, with its crowded and petty effects, and advocated a broader, plainer style, both morally meaningful and more directly imitative of nature.Agnieszka Morawinska, "Eighteenth-Century 'Paysages Moralisés'" ''Journal of the History of Ideas'' 38.3 (July 1977), pp. 461-475, quotes from Morel's ''Théorie''. Morel coined the French term for the landscape professional, ''architecte-paysagiste'', as early as 1804; his ideas were far more influential on the later landscape style of the early nineteenth century than on his immediate contemporaries.

References

Notes

Bibliography

*Disponzio, Joseph John, 2001. "Jean-Marie Morel: A Catalogue of his Landscape Design," ''Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes.'' John Dixon Hunt, ed. Nos. 3 & 4 (July–December 2001) *Disponzio, Joseph John, 2002. "Jean-Marie Morel and the Invention of Landscape Architecture," in ''Tradition and Innovation in French Garden Art''. eds. John Dixon Hunt and Michel Conan. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press) 2002.

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Morel, Jean-Marie 18th-century French architects French landscape garden designers 1728 births 1810 deaths Architects from Lyon