The Louis XIII style or ''Louis Treize'' was a fashion in
French art
French art consists of the visual and plastic arts (including French architecture, woodwork, textiles, and ceramics) originating from the geographical area of France. Modern France was the main centre for the European art of the Upper Paleolith ...
and
architecture
Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing building ...
, especially affecting the
visual
The visual system comprises the sensory organ (the eye) and parts of the central nervous system (the retina containing photoreceptor cells, the optic nerve, the optic tract and the visual cortex) which gives organisms the sense of sight (th ...
and
decorative arts
]
The decorative arts are arts or crafts whose object is the design and manufacture of objects that are both beautiful and functional. It includes most of the arts making objects for the interiors of buildings, and interior design, but not usual ...
. Its distinctness as a period in the history of French art has much to do with the
Regent, regency under which
Louis XIII
Louis XIII (; sometimes called the Just; 27 September 1601 – 14 May 1643) was King of France from 1610 until his death in 1643 and King of Navarre (as Louis II) from 1610 to 1620, when the crown of Navarre was merged with the French crown ...
began his reign (1610–1643). His mother and regent,
Marie de' Medici, imported
Mannerism from her homeland of
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
and the influence of Italian art was to be strongly felt for several decades.
Louis XIII-style painting was influenced from the north, through
Flemish
Flemish (''Vlaams'') is a Low Franconian dialect cluster of the Dutch language. It is sometimes referred to as Flemish Dutch (), Belgian Dutch ( ), or Southern Dutch (). Flemish is native to Flanders, a historical region in northern Belgium; ...
and
Dutch Baroque
Dutch Baroque architecture is a variety of Baroque architecture that flourished in the Dutch Republic and its colonies during the Dutch Golden Age of the 17th century. (Dutch painting during the period is covered by Dutch Golden Age painting).
L ...
, and from the south, through Italian mannerism and early Baroque. Schools developed around
Caravaggio and
Peter Paul Rubens
Sir Peter Paul Rubens (; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat from the Duchy of Brabant in the Southern Netherlands (modern-day Belgium). He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque tradi ...
. Among the French painters who blended Italian mannerism with a love of
genre scenes
Genre art is the pictorial representation in any of various media of scenes or events from everyday life, such as markets, domestic settings, interiors, parties, inn scenes, work, and street scenes. Such representations (also called genre works, ...
were
Georges de La Tour
Georges de La Tour (13 March 1593 – 30 January 1652) was a French Baroque painter, who spent most of his working life in the Duchy of Lorraine, which was temporarily absorbed into France between 1641 and 1648. He painted mostly religious chia ...
,
Simon Vouet
Simon Vouet (; 9 January 1590 – 30 June 1649) was a French painter who studied and rose to prominence in Italy before being summoned by Louis XIII to serve as Premier peintre du Roi in France. He and his studio of artists created religious and ...
, and the
Le Nain brothers. The influence of the painters on subsequent generations, however, was minimised by the rise of
classicism
Classicism, in the arts, refers generally to a high regard for a classical period, classical antiquity in the Western tradition, as setting standards for taste which the classicists seek to emulate. In its purest form, classicism is an aesthet ...
under
Nicolas Poussin and his followers.
Louis XIII architecture was equally influenced by Italian styles. The greatest French architect of the era,
Salomon de Brosse
Salomon de Brosse (c. 1571 – 8 December 1626) was an early 17th-century French architect who moved away from late Mannerism to reassert the French classical style and was a major influence on François Mansart.
Life
Salomon was born in V ...
, designed the
Palais du Luxembourg
The Luxembourg Palace (french: Palais du Luxembourg, ) is at 15 Rue de Vaugirard in the 6th arrondissement of Paris. It was originally built (1615–1645) to the designs of the French architect Salomon de Brosse to be the royal residence of the ...
for Marie de' Medici. De Brosse began a tradition of classicism in architecture that was continued by
Jacques Lemercier
Jacques Lemercier (c. 1585 in Pontoise – 13 January 1654 in Paris) was a French architect and engineer, one of the influential trio that included Louis Le Vau and François Mansart who formed the classicizing French Baroque manner, drawing ...
, who completed the Palais and whose own most famous work of the Louis XIII period is the
Sorbonne Chapel
The Chapel of Sainte Ursule de la Sorbonne, also known as the Sorbonne Chapel, is a Roman Catholic chapel located on the Sorbonne historical site, in the Latin quarter of Paris. It was rebuilt in the 17th century by order of Cardinal Richelieu.
...
(1635). Under the next generation of architects, French Baroque would take an even greater classical shift.
Furniture of the period was typically large and austere.
See also
*
Louis period styles
References
''Encyclopædia Britannica'' Online: Louis XIII style(2016)
{{Revivals , state=collapsed
Baroque architecture in France
Baroque architectural styles
French architectural styles
17th-century French art
.Style
Ancien Régime French architecture
History of furniture
17th century in France