“Natural Art” in France

A key figure of the French Enlightenment, who was also instrumental in preparing the way ideologically for the French Revolution, was Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778). Voltaire believed that the salvation of humanity lay in the advancement of science and the rational improvement of society. In contrast, Rousseau argued that the arts and sciences, society, and civilization in general had corrupted “natural man” – people in their primitive state. He was convinced that humanity’s only salvation lay in a return to something like “the ignorance, innocence and happiness” of its original condition. According to Rousseau, human capacity for feeling, sensibility, and emotions came before reason. Fundamental to Rousseau’s thinking was the notion that “Man by nature is good . . . he is depraved and perverted by society.” Rousseau’s views, popular and widely read were largely responsible for the turning away from the Rococo sensibility in the arts and the formation of a taste for the “natural,” as opposed to the artificial and frivolous.

Reflecting Rousseau’s values, Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin (1699-1779) painted quiet scenes of domestic life in the tradition of seventeenth-century Dutch genre scenes. These subjects offered Chardin the opportunity to praise the simple goodness of ordinary people, especially mothers and young children, who in spirit, occupation, and environment lived far from corrupt society. In Grace, Chardin ushers the viewer into a modest room where a mother and her small daughters are about to dine. The mood of quiet attention is at one with the hushed lighting and mellow color and with the closely studied still-life accessories whose worn surfaces tell their own humble domestic history. The viewer witnesses a moment of social instruction, when mother and older sister supervise the younger sister in the simple, pious ritual of giving thanks to God before a meal. The simplicity of the composition reinforces the subdued charm of this scene, with the three figures highlighted against the dark background. Chardin was the poet of the commonplace and the master of its nuances. A gentle sentiment prevails in all his pictures, an emotion not contrived and artificial but born of the painter’s honesty, insight, and sympathy.^[1]