[Rarebooks] FS: 1812 French Empire Design by Percier & Fontaine

[Joslin Hall Rare Books]

TITLE: "Recueil de Decorations Interieures, comprenant tout ce qui a
Rapport a l’Ameublement..."

By Charles Percier & P.F.L. Fontaine.
Printed in Paris in 1812.

DISCUSSION: Percier and Fontaine were a talented team of
Empire/Neo-Classic designers who helped Napoleon redecorate many of his
residences and public buildings in the new Empire styles and also provided
the designs and models for the French Empire style in furniture and
interior décor, as illustrated here. They met as students at the Paris
Ecole des Beaux Arts and worked together in Rome at the French Academy.
Lincoln Kirstein has much to say about them and their somewhat complicated
relationship with Napoleon in the excellent catalog "The Taste of
Napoleon" (William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, 1969) from which we
take the liberty of quoting liberally-

"As architects and designers, Percier and Fontaine contributed greatly to
the panoply of elegance with which Napoleon surrounded himself. They were
the architects for the Empress Josephine for the remodeling of Malmaison,
they were the architects of the Louvre and of the Tuileries... they worked
at Saint-Cloud, the Trianon, Compiegne, and Fountainebleau...

Percier, supremely disciplined by measuring ancient Roman monuments fused
the various strands into a contemporary Parisian antiquarianism...restored
to a fresh wholeness, scaled down to modern metropolitan needs, primed for
production and use. Elements in the vocabulary -eagles, sphinxes,
victories, wreaths, fasces, columns, trophies, insignia -were worked and
reworked, but Percier's delineation, his exquisite sense of proportion and
fitness, his suggestion of the subtle plasticity of chiseled low-relief,
made it seem like a novel metric to hymn Napoleon's epic."

But it was not all quite that easy. Relations between the Emperor and his
designers could be strained-

"(Napoleon) was unpardonably rude to Charles Percier, a sickly mouse of a
man, angelic character, marvelous draftsman, since he was too shy and busy
to set himself constantly in the Emperor's entourage and play an assiduous
courtier. Whereupon, Napoleon pretended he didn't exist. Fortunately his
devoted comrade Fontaine, a bold, hard-shelled, skillful administrator
protected Percier to do his best work, secluded in an almost secret
studio, between floors in the Louvre. ... It is likely Napoleon was aware
of Percier's part in his partnership with Fontaine; only he hadn't the
patience to placate shyness; it saved time to talk to one strong foreman
rather than a committee of two... Fontaine's great service lay in knowing
how far he could risk Percier's freedom... Official recognition of the
true genius of the partnership came late. It was not easy to work for
Bonaparte. ... The team of Percier and Fontaine, in the capacities of
supreme designer, agile diplomat, expediter, and shop-manager, learned how
to accommodate Josephine's whim to Napoleon's will. It was she who had
Percier's name written in on letters-patent naming Fontaine Architect of
the Palace. How could two such loving comrades be separated? This was as
much taste as sentiment...".

This oversized volume features grandly decorated cabinets, chairs, sofas
and other furniture, as well as wall panels and decorations, and silver
candelabra and dishes, and all sorts of other decorations. A frenzied,
meticulously detailed explosion of Empirical Neo-Classicism.

DESCRIPTION: Hardcover. 11.5”x16.5”, 43 pages of text with an engraved
vignette, plus 72 engraved plates. Bound in old vellum-covered boards with
a leather spine label.

CONDITION NOTES: Boards somewhat worn, scuffed and soiled [see photo].
Contents with some light soil and light variable foxing; not in pristine
condition, but still a very nice example of an important book.

PRICE: $2,500

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