Objects : 8
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Object / IIe République – 2nd Empire/2nd Republic-2nd Empire‘La Danse’: Carpeaux’s sculpture for the façade of the Opéra Garnier
In 1861, to many people’s astonishment, the young architect Charles Garnier (1825-1898) won the competition to design a new opera house in Paris. The project was launched by Napoleon III a short while after Orsini’s attack of 14 January 1858, when the latter had attempted to assassinate the Imperial Couple as they arrived for a […]
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ObjectNapoleon wrapped in his dream
This posthumous portrait of Napoleon Bonaparte carved in marble must be one of the most curious works to come out of the studio of French sculptor Auguste Rodin. It was commissioned in 1904 by the American collector Kate Seney Simpson,The daughter of a Brooklyn banker and art collector, George I. Seney and wife of New […]
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ObjectProjet for the Bonaparte Forum in Madrid
Joseph Bonaparte, a new king for Spain On 20 July 1808, Joseph Bonaparte arrived in Madrid, the capital of what Théophile Gautier was to describe as the most “anti-classical” country in Europe. In comparison with Paris – and even with Naples where Joseph had reigned for two years -, Madrid was a small town that […]
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ObjectScale-model for Brongniard’s Palais de la Bourse
The Palais Impérial de la Bourse (Imperial Palace of the Stock Exchange) was conceived by Napoleon as part of a wider political and architectural program. Upon his coming to power with the coup of 18 Brumaire, Napoleon was determined to rebuild the political institutions of France which had for a decade been shaken by Revolution. […]
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ObjectModel of the Column of the Grande Armée
This model was on show at the exhibition Napoléon et l’Europe at the Musée de l’Armée, Paris, from 27 March 2013 to 14 July 2013. After the victory at Austerlitz, the director of the musée Napoleon, Vivant Denon, suggested to the Emperor that the project for a national column, begun in 1803 for the place Vendôme, […]
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ObjectAn Egyptian tea-service
Part of an Egyptian tea service, composed of a teapot and nine teacups and saucers in the “Denon-Etruscan form”, all in a beautiful deep blue, decorated with gold hieroglyphics and vignettes representing various sights in Egypt. On 7 January 1810, just three weeks after his divorce, Napoleon wrote to Josephine from his Palais des Tuileries: “I […]
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ObjectPortrait of Napoleon (miniature set on a box)
As early as the end of the 18th century, Jean-Baptiste Isabey was celebrated as one of the greatest French miniaturists ever. At that time, the miniature genre was at its apogee in terms of popularity, a popularity supported by the Revolutionary wars and later the campaigns of Napoleon, since each soldier wanted to take with […]
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ObjectRatapoil
Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte’s election to the presidency of the Second French Republic, on 10 December, 1848, was the catalyst for a wave of militant opposition to the new regime. The Prince-President was all too aware that his post could only last four years and was not renewable, and so he pursued an intense campaign in 1850 […]