school of Fontainebleau

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Diana the Huntress, oil on canvas by an anonymous artist of the school … (credit: Giraudon/Art Resource, New York)

French and foreign artists associated with the court at Fontainebleau in the 16th century. In 1528 Francis I began to rebuild the palace and hired Rosso Fiorentino and Francesco Primaticcio to produce the mural decoration, stuccowork, and sculptural reliefs; also among the Italian artists was Benvenuto Cellini. Many engravings were made of the work being done, and much of the most decorative painting and sculpture can still be seen there. The Italian masters successfully adapted their own styles to the French taste and were assisted by French and Flemish artists; together they produced a distinctive style of Mannerism. The innovation of stucco ornament in combination with mural painting had great influence on French art of the time.

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The school of Fontainebleau takes its name from the château of Fontainebleau, located about thirtyseven miles southeast of Paris, the preferred residence of King Francis I (ruled 1515–1547). The term does not pertain to an educational institution. Rather, it refers to a cohesive group of artists engaged by the king, and after his death by his son Henry II, to decorate interiors of the château with frescoes, elaborately carved wood paneling and stucco sculptures, and by extension, the style of this décor and the prints (particularly those from c. 1542–1547) that reproduced the compositions of many of the frescoes. Indeed, Henri Zerner pointed out (The French Renaissance in Prints, p. 22) that the expression "school of Fontainebleau" was first used by Adam Bartsch (1818), one of the foremost authorities on graphic art, to classify the etchings and engravings produced by the artists employed at Fontainebleau, or in their style. (The "second school" of Fontainebleau was the next generation of artists who worked at Fontainebleau, around 1600.)

Led by the Florentine painter Rosso Fiorentino (born Giovanni Battista di Jacopo de' Rossi, or di Guasparre, 1494–1540) and the Bolognese Francesco Primaticcio (1504–1570), the artists of the school of Fontainebleau were not only French but also included a number of Italians and some Flemish painters and draftsmen (e.g., Luca Penni, Étienne Delaune, Geoffroy Dumoustier, Léonard Thiry, René Boyvin, Antonio Fantuzzi, Giorgio Mantovano Ghisi, Pierre Milan, and Domenico del Barbiere, also called Dominique Florentin, who was also a sculptor). They produced figures in a mannered style characterized by sinuous lines and elongated proportions, frequently arranged in difficult, unrealistic poses. A sense of anguished urgency runs through nearly all of Rosso's compositions. His suicide called attention to the tormented quality of his work.

Rosso was recommended to Francis I by the Venetian poet Aretino, who was the painter's friend. Although the king's predecessors Charles VIII (ruled 1483–1498) and Louis XII (ruled 1498–1515) fostered a keen interest in the Italian revival of classical antiquity, Francis I had a single-mindedness of purpose that caused Italian mannerism to be directly transplanted into France. After his military campaigns in Italy met with disaster, he seems to have resolved to use the arts instead to become the rival of Charles V, the popes, and Henry VIII. He accomplished this through sophisticated alterations in his palace at Blois; the creation of a gigantic castle of Chambord; a new château ironically named "Madrid"; and the enlargement and embellishment of the old château at Fontainebleau.

The key ensemble at Fontainebleau is the Galerie François Ier (gallery of Francis I), a long, relatively narrow passageway constructed in 1528 to link the early château with a nearby abbey. Although the gallery was structurally altered over the years, the interior decoration (mostly completed in 1534–1536) continues to inspire fascination. The walls are lined by a high wood dado, originally created by Scibec de' Carpi, carved with Italianate decorative motifs called strapwork that imitate heavy coils of stiffened leather. The king's emblem, the salamander, appears throughout. Above the dado stretches a series of frescoes depicting classical myths and abstruse allegories related to the king's reign. Sumptuous stucco frames surround and link the frescoes. They comprise not only decorative moldings and reliefs (and subsidiary frescoes), but also nearly life-size, almost freestanding human figures of extraordinary intricacy and elegance. Rosso is credited with the entire design, but because Primaticcio had previously worked in stucco while employed in Mantua, he is believed to have collaborated on the stuccos. A series of tapestries begun during Rosso's lifetime (now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna) reproduces scenes from the gallery, although with numerous variations. The strapwork of the famous stucco frames, where animate and inanimate forms seem interchangeable, was disseminated throughout Europe by engravings. In some of these, the mythological subjects of the frescoes were later replaced by landscapes, which had broader appeal.

Primaticcio was responsible for several outstanding decorative ensembles at Fontainebleau, among them the chambre du roi (king's bedroom, 1533–1535), the chambre de la duchesse d'Étampes (bedroom of the king's mistress, the duchess of Étampes, 1541–1544), the gallery of Ulysses (mostly 1541–1549), and most impressive of all, the salle de bal (ballroom, c. 1551–1557). In contrast with the gallery of Francis I, the ballroom has spacious proportions; its mythological frescoes depict festive subjects in keeping with its function. The muscular, superhuman proportions of Primaticcio's figures, inspired by Michelangelo's, decisively influenced French art of the time, not only in the paintings of Primaticcio's most important collaborator, Niccolò dell' Abbate (and even later in the work of Ambroise Dubois and Toussaint Dubreuil, of the second school of Fontainebleau), but also in the sculptures of the great Germain Pilon, who may have been employed at Fontainebleau early in his career.

Bibliography

Blunt, Anthony. Art and Architecture in France 1500–1700. Harmondsworth, U.K., and New York, 1977.

L'École de Fontainebleau. Exh. cat., Grand Palais, Paris, 1972.

The French Renaissance in Prints. Exh. cat., UCLA/Metropolitan Museum of Art/Bibliothèque nationale, Los Angeles, New York, and Paris, 1994.

Zerner, Henri. L'art de la Renaissance en France: L'invention du classicisme. Paris, 1996.

—MARY L. LEVKOFF

"Diane the Huntress" - School of Fontainebleau (1550-60) (Louvre)

The Ecole de Fontainebleau refers to two periods of artistic production in France during the late Renaissance centered around the royal Château de Fontainebleau, that were crucial in forming the French version of Northern Mannerism.

First School of Fontainebleau (from 1531)

• Rosso Fiorentino (Giovanni Battista di Jacopo de' Rossi) (1494–1540) (Italian)
• Francesco Primaticcio (c.1505-1570) (Italian)
• Niccolò dell'Abbate (c.1509-1571) (Italian)
• Juste de Juste (c.1505-1559) Franco-Italian sculptor and etcher

Second School of Fontainebleau (from 1594)

• Ambroise Dubois (c.1542-1614) (Flemish born)
• Toussaint Dubreuil (c.1561-1602)
• Martin Fréminet (1567–1619)

In 1531, the Florentine artist Rosso Fiorentino, having lost most of his possessions at the Sack of Rome in 1527, was invited by François I to come to France, where he began an extensive decorative program for the Château de Fontainebleau. In 1532 he was joined by another Italian artist, Francesco Primaticcio (from Bologna). Rosso died in France in 1540. On the advice of Primaticcio, Niccolò dell'Abbate (from Modena) was invited to France in 1552 by François's son Henri II. Although known for their work at Fontainebleau, these artists were also invited to create works of art for other noble families of the period and were much esteemed and well-paid.

The works of this "first school of Fontainebleau" are characterized by the extensive use of stucco (moldings and picture frames) and frescos, and an elaborate (and often mysterious) system of allegories and mythological iconography. Renaissance decorative motifs such as grotesques, strapwork and putti are common, as well as a certain degree of eroticism. The figures are elegant and show the influence of the techniques of the Italian Mannerism of Michelangelo, Raphael and especially Parmigianino. Primaticcio was also directed to make copies of antique Roman statues for the king, thus spreading the influence of classical statuary. Many of the works of Rosso, Primaticcio and dell'Abate have not survived; parts of the Chateau were remodelled at various dates. The paintings of the group were reproduced in prints , mostly etchings, which were apparently produced initially at Fontainebleau itself, and later in Paris. These disseminated the style through France and beyond, and also record several paintings that have not survived.

The mannerist style of the Fontainebleau school influenced French artists (with whom the Italians worked) such as the painter Jean Cousin the Elder, the sculptors Jean Goujon and Germain Pilon, and, to a lesser degree, the painter and portraitist François Clouet the son of Jean Clouet.

"Lady at her Toilet" - School of Fontainebleau (1585–1595) (Musée des Beaux-Arts, Dijon)

From 1584 to 1594, during the Wars of Religion the château of Fontainebleau was abandoned. Upon his ascension to the throne, Henri IV undertook a renovation of the Fontainebleau buildings using a group of artists: the Flemish born Ambroise Dubois (from Antwerp) and the Parisians Toussaint Dubreuil and Martin Fréminet. They are sometimes referred to as the "second school of Fontainebleau". Their late mannerist works, many of which have been lost, continue in the use of elongated and undulating forms and crowded compositions. Many of their subjects include mythological scenes and scenes from works of fiction by the Italian Torquato Tasso and the ancient Greek novelist Heliodorus of Emesa.

Their style would continue to have an influence on artists through the first decades of the 17th century, but other artistic currents (Peter Paul Rubens, Caravaggio, the Dutch and Flemish naturalist schools) would soon eclipse them.

See also

• French art
• French Renaissance

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