Rome-Paris 1640 - Cultural Exchange and the Rebirth of an Artistic School

Starting in the late 1620s, artistic exchanges between Rome and Paris became particularly frequent. From the trips taken by French artists to Rome and their returns after stays of varying lengths (Simon Vouet, Nicolas Poussin, Jacques Stella, and others) to the travels of Italians to France (Orazio Gentileschi, the Francini family, Bernini’s assistants, and others), artists and patrons, art dealers, and collectors continuously fostered a dialogue between the arts of the two countries beginning in the 1630s. But beyond these exchanges, there was indeed a desire on France’s part to supplant Rome in artistic and political supremacy in Europe. Cardinal Richelieu and later Mazarin thus drew inspiration from the example of the Barberini family to foster the arts in Paris—as collectors and passionate theater enthusiasts—and by decisively influencing the choice of certain aesthetic elements. Beyond a political vision of art, what we are witnessing in Paris during the 1630s–1650s is indeed a cultural renaissance, marked in particular by an increase in cultural exchanges (artistic models, intermediaries, theoretical concepts) between the two countries and the two cities.

Symposium organized by Marc Bayard, Special Advisor on Art History.