18 Works, July 5th. is Louis-Léopold Boilly's day, his story, illustrated with footnotes #182

Louis-Léopold Boilly (1761–1845)

A Man Vaccinating a Young Child Held by Its Mother, with Other Members of the Household Looking On, c. 1807 (?)

Oil on canvas

H 44.5 x W 58 cm

Wellcome Collection

Smallpox was once a common epidemic disease that killed, blinded or disfigured its victims. In the eighteenth century its impact was reduced in Europe by a Chinese practice called variolation, the injection of smallpox fluid from an infected human being into a healthy human. In 1798 Edward Jenner proposed a modification of variolation called vaccination, which involved the injection of fluid from an infected cow into human beings. This painting, produced in France in about 1807, shows a family being vaccinated. The children are very scared of the new procedure, while the adults seem to be happy about it. Vaccination was at first not entirely accepted. It had been introduced from England to France in 1801, in a period in which the two countries were generally at war, so fear of poisoning by foreign agents could have been in some people's minds at the time. Although vaccination against smallpox remained controversial for many years, and other types of vaccination such as MMR still are, it played a major part in the eventual elimination of smallpox. More on this painting

Louis-Léopold Boilly (5 July 1761 – 4 January 1845) was a French painter and draftsman. A gifted creator of popular portrait paintings, he also produced a vast number of genre paintings vividly documenting French middle-class social life. His life and work spanned the eras of monarchical France, the French Revolution, the Napoleonic Empire, the Bourbon Restoration and the July Monarchy. His 1800 painting Un Trompe-l'œil (See below) introduced the term trompe-l'œil ("trick the eye"), applied to the technique that uses realistic imagery to create the optical illusion that the depicted objects exist in three dimensions, though the "unnamed" technique itself had existed in Greek and Roman times.

Louis-Léopold Boilly

Trompe l'oeil Tabletop, c. before 1793

Oil on rosewood

H 76 x W 112 cm

National Trust, Wimpole Hall

Boilly was born in La Bassée in northern France, the son of a local wood sculptor. A self-taught painter, Boilly began his career at a very young age, producing his first works at the age of twelve or thirteen. In 1774 he began to show his work to the Austin friars of Douai who were evidently impressed: within three years, the bishop of Arras invited the young man to work and study in his bishopric. While there, he produced a cascade of paintings – some three hundred small works of portraiture. He received instruction in trompe-l'œil painting from Dominique Doncre (1743–1820) before moving to Paris around 1787.

Louis Léopold Boilly

The Suitor's Gift

Oil on canvas

46.3 x 37.7 cm (18¹/₄ x 14⁷/₈ inches)

Private collection

A beautiful, elegantly dressed young woman looks out knowingly at the viewer as she receives the attentions of a suitor. On the table in front of her a luxurious gift box lies open. Several strands of pink ribbon fall from the sides, and two white roses are placed within, possibly alluding to her purity and adolescence. Her face is rosy and her cheeks slightly plump, suggestive of her obvious youth. Her loose hair is softly curled, and a pink ribbon is tied around the crown of her head. She is wearing a delicate pink corseted gown with a thin gauze overskirt, which just reveals the colour underneath. Around her shoulders she holds a chiffon mantle with decorative white lace fringing tied at the back in a bow. She looks directly at the viewer, deliberately turning her face away from her suitor whilst she makes up her mind whether she approves of his gift, or not. Her admirer crouches behind her, concealed somewhat in the shadows. He gazes at her intently, eagerly waiting for the young lady’s reaction. He clutches what appears to be a crucifix about his neck, possibly willing for divine assistance in his quest to gain the young woman’s affections. His emotions are completely in the hands of the young woman and the way a slight smile plays across her lips suggests that she is fully aware of the power which she holds. There is a subtle contradiction in the way that this lady, so ostentatiously young and pure in appearance, in fact plays with her suitor’s emotions with so much worldliness and guile. Instead it is the much older figure who appears helpless and naïve. More on this painting

Louis Léopold Boilly

Maternal advice, c. 1791

Oil on canvas

63.5 x 52.3 cm (25 x 20⁵ / ₈ inches)

Private collection

The present painting is the prime version of a composition treated by Boilly on at least two other occasions. One is in a private collection and the other is in the Musée des ArtsDécoratifs, Paris. The Decorative Arts picture is in grisaille and forms part of a set of three grisailles, which include The Delicate Gift (See above) and On la tire aujourd'hui (See below). More on this painting

Salvatore Tresca after Louis-Léopold Boilly

It was pulled today (On la tire aujourd'hui)

Color stipple and etching

Width: cadre 53.5 cm Height: cadre 62 cm

 National Gallery of Art, Washington

Louis-Léopold Boilly (1761–1845)

A young Woman mocking an elderly Admirer

Oil on canvas

H 42 x W 32 cm

The Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology

Louis-Léopold Boilly (1761–1845)

The Sorrows of Love, c. 1790

Oil on canvas

H 45 x W 55 cm

The Wallace Collection

A lady, supported by her confidante, mourns the end of an affair, as a servant returns her portrait and unopened love-letter. The subject is typical of the sentimental bourgeois genre scenes with which the artist first made his reputation. A label attached to its stretcher reveals that it formed part of an important early commission of gallant genre scenes painted for the Avignon collector, Calvet de Lapalun. Boilly was noted for his meticulous technique and 'The Sorrows of Love', in particular, is remarkable for the artist’s masterly use of colour in the rendering of the shot-silks of the costumes. More on this painting

Louis-Léopold Boilly (1761–1845)

The Visit Returned, c.1789

Oil on canvas

H 45 x W 55 cm

The Wallace Collection

'The Visit Returned' shows a lady making an impromptu visit to her lover, whom she surprises in the act of writing to her, while her portrait balances above his desk It has been suggested that 'The Visit Returned' should be twinned with another scene by Boilly, called 'La visite reçue' (1789; Saint Omer, Musée Sandelin), which shows a girl entertaining a soldier while secretly sending a letter, possibly to the gentleman seen in 'The Visit Returned'. More on this painting

Louis-Léopold Boilly (1761–1845)

The Visit Received 1789

Oil on canvas

Musée Sandelin

Within a clear and orderly composition, a young woman receives a note from the hand of a young boy represented in the corner of the door. The scene takes place stealthily and without the knowledge of an officer, placed in the semi-darkness and whose presence is indicated by the clothes he has placed on the armchair in the foreground. More on this painting

Boilly's early works showed a preference for amorous and moralising subjects. The Suitor's Gift (See above) is comparable to much of his work in the 1790s. His small-scale paintings with carefully mannered colouring and precise detailing recalled the work of seventeenth-century Dutch genre painters such as Gabriël Metsu (1629–1667), Willem van Mieris and Gerard ter Borch (1617–1681), of whose work Boilly owned an important collection.

Louis-Léopold Boilly (1761–1845)

The Morning Wash: Woman on a Bidet, c.1790

Oil on canvas

I have no further description, at this time

At the height of the revolutionary Terror in 1794, Boilly was condemned by the Committee of Public Safety for the erotic undertones of his work. This offence was remedied by Boilly's eleventh-hour production of the more patriotic Triumph of Marat (now in the Musée des Beaux Arts, Lille) which saved him from serious penalties.

Louis-Léopold Boilly

The Triumph of Marat, c. 1794

Oil on paper (seven sheets) mounted on canvas

80cm x 120cm.

Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lille

Until this time the picture had been interpreted in a way which tended to confirm Boilly's anti-Revolutionary credentials. Tradition had it that it was painted under duress, in order to vindicate Boilly against charges of anti-Republicanism made against him by a fellow artist from the Lille, the painter Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Wicar.  On 22nd April 1794, at the height of the Terror, Wicar denounced before the patriotic Société Républicaine des Arts, certain works of a shocking obscenity that offended Republican morality, and which must be "burned at the foot of the Tree of Liberty". The Society duly agreed to draw up a list of offending works for presentation to the Committee of Public Safety and the police.  Boilly, who was mentioned by name, was warned of the danger he was in by one of his colleagues and improvised this Revolutionary subject in record time.  In some accounts he was even subject to a domiciliary visit and was saved from imprisonment only by the presence of the painting in his studio. The Société was so impressed by his patriotic credentials that in May 1794 it accepted him as one of their members. More on this painting

After 1794, Boilly began to produce far more crowded compositions that serve as social chronicles of the urban middle class. In these works, his observation of contemporary customs is slightly sentimental and often humorous.

Louis-Léopold Boilly

The Artist's Wife in his Studio, c. 1795-99

Oil on canvas, 53 x 45 cm

The Clark Art Institute, Williamstown

A young woman, traditionally identified as Boilly’s wife, examines a large portfolio amid the clutter of the artist’s studio, which includes an unpainted canvas, a plaster cast of a hand, and sculptures by other artists. She looks up from her task as if either she or we have intruded. The violin hanging from the back of the chair hints at the relationship between artist and sitter—musical instruments sometimes appear in paintings as symbols of romantic love. More on this painting

Louis-Léopold Boilly

At the Entrance, c. 1796-98

Oil on panel

40 x 31 cm

The Hermitage, St. Petersburg

Boilly made his name in the early 1790s thanks to his frivolous scenes that captured the spirit of the late Rococo. After being censured for such subjects during the first years of the French Revolution, he produced a series of patriotic works. He soon returned to genre painting, however, and gained a reputation as a straightforward chronicler of early-nineteenth-century daily life in Paris. In this painting he precisely recorded the fashion of France's Directory era. More on this painting

Boilly was a popular and celebrated painter of his time. He was among the first artists to produce lithographs, and became wealthy from the sale of his prints and paintings. He was awarded a medal by the Parisian Salon in 1804 for his work The Arrival of a Mail-coach in the Courtyard of the Messageries (See below). In 1833 he was decorated as a chevalier of the nation's highest order, the Légion d'honneur.

Louis-Léopold Boilly  (1761–1845)

The Arrival of a Stage-coach in the Courtyard of the Messageries, rue Notre-Dame-des-Victoires, in Parisc. 1803

Oil on canvas

Height: 62 cm (24.4 in); Width: 108 cm (42.5 in)

Louvre Museum

Boilly, Louis Léopold

L'averse/ The downpour, c. 1800 - 1825

Oil on canvas

Height: 0.325 m; Width: 0.405 m

Louvre Museum

Boilly, Louis Léopold

Cabaret scene, c. 1800 - 1825

Oil on canvas

Height: 0.375 m; Width: 0.475 m

Louvre Museum

His interest in caricature is most apparent in his suite of 98 lithographs titled Recueil de grimaces, published between 1823 and 1828 (See below).

Louis-Léopold Boilly

The Effect of Melodrama, circa 1830

Oil on canvas

H. 49 cm, l. 59 cm (with frame)

Lambinet museum

These two works form chronicles of Parisian life and take place in a theater box at the time of Louis-Philippe, a rare theme among painters at the time. In the first painting, the artist paints the middle bourgeoisie in a "porcelain" manner with subtle color accords. More on this painting

BOILLY Louis-Léopold (1761-1845)

A box, one day of free show, c. 1830

Oil on canvas

H. 56 cm, l. 64 cm

Musée Lambinet

In the second, more popular, the artist seduces with his qualities as a caricaturist, and takes up the tradition of "expression heads" initiated in the 16th century by Leonardo da Vinci. Finally, the art of trompe-l'œil, dear to Boilly, should be noted. The two paintings were gradually acquired by the Lambinet museum with the aim of bringing them together. More on this painting

Boilly was also well respected for his portraiture. By the end of his lifetime he had painted about 5,000 portraits, most of which were painted on canvases measuring 22 cm x 17 cm (8 5/8 in. x 6 5/8 in.). He worked quickly, and boasted of requiring only two hours to complete a portrait. He painted both middle class sitters and prominent contemporaries such as Robespierre. Boilly's portraits strongly characterize the sitters as individuals, and are usually painted in a sober range of colors.

Boilly died in Paris on 4 January 1845. His youngest son, Alphonse Boilly (1801–1867), was a professional engraver who apprenticed in New York with Asher Brown Durand.  More on Louis-Léopold Boilly

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