Jean Berain the Elder (1640 – 24 January 1711) was a draughtsman and designer, painter and engraver of ornament, the artistic force in the Royal office of the

Menus-Plaisirs du Roi The Menus-Plaisirs du Roi () was, in the organisation of the France, French royal household under the Ancien Régime, the department of the Maison du Roi responsible for the "lesser pleasures of the King", which meant in practice that it was in ...

where all the designs originated for court spectacle, from fêtes to funerals, and many designs for furnishings not covered by the

Bâtiments du Roi The Bâtiments du Roi (, 'King's Buildings') was a division of the Maison du Roi ('King's Household') in France under the Ancien Régime. It was responsible for building works at the King's residences in and around Paris. History The Bâtiments ...

. The "Berainesque" style of light arabesques and playful grotesques was an essential element in the ''style Régence'' that led to the French

Rocaille Rocaille ( , ) was a French style of exuberant decoration, with an abundance of curves, counter-curves, undulations and elements modeled on nature, that appeared in furniture and interior decorative arts, decoration during the early reign of Lo ...

and European

Rococo Rococo, less commonly Roccoco ( , ; or ), also known as Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and dramatic style of architecture, art and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpte ...

. Born in

Saint-Mihiel Saint-Mihiel () is a commune in the Meuse department in the Grand Est region in Northeastern France. Geography Saint-Mihiel lies on the banks of the river Meuse. History A Benedictine abbey was established here in 708 or 709 by Count Wulfoalde ...

, Meuse, in the

Austrian Netherlands The Austrian Netherlands was the territory of the Burgundian Circle of the Holy Roman Empire between 1714 and 1797. The period began with the acquisition by the Austrian Habsburg monarchy of the former Spanish Netherlands under the Treaty of Ras ...

, he was the son of a master gunsmith, in whose line of work

engraving Engraving is the practice of incising a design on a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a Burin (engraving), burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or Glass engraving, glass ar ...

was a prominent technique. He spent his career in Paris. Long after his death the connoisseur

Pierre-Jean Mariette Pierre-Jean Mariette (; 7 May 1694 – 10 September 1774) was a collector of and dealer in old master prints, a renowned connoisseur, especially of prints and drawings, and a chronicler of the careers of French Italian and Flemish artists. He ...

wrote of him, "Nothing was done, in whatever genre that it might have been, unless it were in his manner, or where he had given designs for it." Through his engravings and those of his son, his style was highly influential beyond the court and Paris, notably in the Low Countries, Germany and London. His close friendship with

Nicodemus Tessin the Younger Count Nicodemus Tessin the Younger (23 May 1654 – 10 April 1728) was a Swedish Baroque architect, city planner, and administrator. The son of Nicodemus Tessin the Elder and the father of Carl Gustaf Tessin, Tessin the Younger was the midd ...

ensured that Berain's own nuance in the

Louis XIV style The Louis XIV style or ''Louis Quatorze'' ( , ), also called French classicism, was the style of architecture and decorative arts intended to glorify King Louis XIV and his reign. It featured majesty, harmony and regularity. It became the official ...

was transmitted to court circles in

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...

Berain was established in Paris by 1663. On 28 December 1674 he was appointed ''dessinateur de la Chambre et du cabinet du Roi'' (designer of the king's chamber and office) in the Menus-Plaisirs (a post he retained until his death), in succession to Henri de Gissey, whose pupil he is believed to have been. From 1677 onward he had workrooms and an apartment in the Galeries du Louvre near to those of

André Charles Boulle André — sometimes transliterated as Andre — is the French and Portuguese form of the name Andrew and is now also used in the English-speaking world. It used in France, Quebec, Canada and other French-speaking countries, as well in Portugal ...

, for whom he made many designs for furniture. After the death of

Charles Le Brun Charles Le Brun (; baptised 24 February 1619 – 12 February 1690) was a French Painting, painter, Physiognomy, physiognomist, Aesthetics, art theorist, and a director of several art schools of his time. He served as a court painter to Louis XIV, ...

Berain was commissioned to compose and supervise the whole of the exterior decoration of the king's ships. His first designs for royal interiors date from the years 1682–1684. He was inventive and industrious, and, beginning with interiors at the Hôtel de Mailly (1687–88) assimilated and adapted Raphaelesque

grotesque Since at least the 18th century (in French and German, as well as English), grotesque has come to be used as a general adjective for the strange, mysterious, magnificent, fantastic, hideous, ugly, incongruous, unpleasant, or disgusting, and thus ...

ornament to the taste of the time. He provided

arabesque The arabesque is a form of artistic decoration consisting of "surface decorations based on rhythmic linear patterns of scrolling and interlacing foliage, tendrils" or plain lines, often combined with other elements. Another definition is "Foliate ...

designs for the manufacture of

Beauvais tapestry The Beauvais Manufactory () is a historic tapestry factory in Beauvais, France. It was second in importance, after the Gobelins Manufactory, of French tapestry workshops that were established under the general direction of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, th ...

. At

Meudon Meudon () is a French Communes of France, commune located in the Hauts-de-Seine Departments of France, department in the Île-de-France Regions of France, region, on the left bank of the Seine. It is located from the Kilometre Zero, center of P ...

for Louis, ''le Grand Dauphin'', whose favourite designer he remained. Berain's decors, beginning in 1699, initiated the Régence style that was a precursor of the

Bérain also designed for the theatre. By 1674 he had already begun designing costumes for

Jean-Baptiste Lully Jean-Baptiste Lully ( – 22 March 1687) was a French composer, dancer and instrumentalist of Italian birth, who is considered a master of the French Baroque music style. Best known for his operas, he spent most of his life working in the court o ...

's Opéra, including costumes for dancers in the ''divertissements''. For Lully's 1684 opera '' Amadis'', a tale of chivalric romance, Bérain carried out research into the styles of the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

and the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) is a Periodization, period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and sur ...

, a historical approach to costume design that was unusual for the time. Besides costume designs for Lully's '' tragédies en musique'', Bérain designed the costumes for Lully's ballets ''Le triomphe de l'amour'' (1681) and ''Le temple de la paix'' (1685). Armide portada libreto

In 1680 he additionally took over

Carlo Vigarani Carlo Vigarani ( – 17 February 1713)Sheren and La Gorce 2001. was an Italian scenic designer who worked as ("royal engineer") and then ("intendant to the King's pleasures") at the court of the French king Louis XIV until 1690. He was born in ...

's work as the designer of the Opéra's

stage machinery Stage machinery, also known as stage mechanics, comprises the mechanical devices used to create special effects in theatrical productions, including scene changes, lowering actors through the stage floor (traps) and enabling actors to 'fly' ove ...

and scenery, and until 1707 he was in charge of staging all lyric works produced at the

Théâtre du Palais-Royal The Théâtre du Palais-Royal () is a 750-seat Parisian theatre at 38 rue de Montpensier, located at the northwest corner of the Palais-Royal in the Galerie de Montpensier at its intersection with the Galerie de Beaujolais. Brief history O ...

in Paris as well as at the royal residences. After Lully's death in 1687, he created designs for the earliest ''

opéra-ballet Opéra-ballet (; plural: ''opéras-ballets'') is a genre of French Baroque lyric theatre that was most popular during the 18th century, combining elements of opera and ballet, "that grew out of the '' ballets à entrées'' of the early seventeen ...

s'', Pascal Colasse's ''Les saisons'' (1695) and

André Campra André Campra (; baptized 4 December 1660 – 29 June 1744) was a French composer and conductor of the Baroque era. The leading French opera composer in the period between Jean-Baptiste Lully and Jean-Philippe Rameau, Campra wrote several '' trag ...

's ''

L'Europe galante ''L'Europe galante'' (''Galant Europe'') is an opéra-ballet in a prologue and four entrées by André Campra to a French libretto by Antoine Houdar de la Motte. The opera is regarded as the first opéra-ballet, with the entrées sharing a com ...

'' (1697). In his set designs Bérain continued using highly symmetrical single-point perspective, following in the footsteps of his Italian predecessors

Giacomo Torelli Giacomo Torelli (1 September 1608 – 17 June 1678) was an Italian stage designer, scenery painter, engineer, and architect. His work in stage design, particularly his designs of machinery for creating spectacular scenery changes and other spe ...

and Vigarani, as well as Giovanni Francesco Grimaldi and Giovanni Burnacini. He never employed the ''per angolo'' (oblique) perspective designs that were being tried in Italy by designers such as the Galli-Bibienas.La Gorce 2001. In 1692 it was Bérain who worked with the

Royal Family A royal family is the immediate family of monarchs and sometimes their extended family. The term imperial family appropriately describes the family of an emperor or empress, and the term papal family describes the family of a pope, while th ...

on the occasion of the marriage of Philippe d'Orléans to the kings illegitimate daughter Françoise-Marie de Bourbon, ''Mademoiselle de Blois''. Bérain designed their jewelled wedding clothes and their private apartments at the

Palais-Royal The Palais-Royal () is a former French royal palace located on Rue Saint-Honoré in the 1st arrondissement of Paris. The screened entrance court faces the Place du Palais-Royal, opposite the Louvre Palace, Louvre. Originally called the Palais-Ca ...

in the Capital. His numerous designs were for the most part engraved under his own supervision; a collection of them was published in Paris in 1711 by his son-in-law, Jacques Thuret, clockmaker to the king from 1694. There are three books, ''L'Œuvre de J. Berain'', ''Ornements inventés par J. Berain'' and ''Œuvres de J. Berain contenant des ornements d'architecture''.` Désiré Guilmard in ''Les Maîtres ornemanistes'', gives a complete list of his published works. His son and pupil, Jean Berain the Younger (1678–1726), was born and died in Paris. He exercised the same official functions after his father's death and worked in a very similar taste.

Notes

References

*Fiske Kimball, ''Creation of the Rococo,'' (Philadelphia Museum of Art) 1943 * Jérôme de La Gorce, ''Berain, dessinateur du Roi Soleil'', Paris, Herscher, 1986 *Jérôme de La Gorce, "Berain, Jean" in ''

The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language '' Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and t ...

'', 2nd edition, edited by

Stanley Sadie Stanley John Sadie (; 30 October 1930 – 21 March 2005) was a British musicologist, music critic, and editor. He was editor of the sixth edition of the '' Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' (1980), which was published as the first edition ...

, London, Macmillan, 2001. (hardcover), (eBook), and

Grove Music Online ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language '' Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and t ...

. *Jérôme de La Gorce, "Berain, Jean", vol. 1, pp. 425–426, in ''International Encyclopedia of Dance'', edited by Selma Jeanne Cohen, New York, Oxford University Press, 2004 *Roger-Armand Weigert, ''Jean I Berain, dessinateur de la Chambre et du Cabinet du roi (1640–1711)'', Paris, Les Éditions d'art et d'histoire, 1936 * {{DEFAULTSORT:Berain, Jean (The Elder) 1640 births 1711 deaths People from Saint-Mihiel French draughtsmen Furniture designers from Paris French tapestry artists French Baroque painters