Vue d'optique: La Façade du Château de St.-Cloud, by Daumont, Paris, France

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Seller: rlg02111 ✉️ (963) 100%, Location: Boston, Massachusetts, US, Ships to: US & many other countries, Item: 375005392068 Vue d'optique: La Façade du Château de St.-Cloud, by Daumont, Paris, France.

Title:  La Façade du Château de St.-Cloud

 

Dimensions:   Sheet: 19-1/4"W x 12-3/4"H

                        Plate impression: 17-1/2"W x 12"H

The engraver:  Daumont

 

Description:

This auction is for a hand colored Vue d’Optique engraving depicting the east façade of the Chateau de Saint-Cloud.  The chateau sat at the top of a hill above the Seine, just opposite the southern end of the Bois de Boulogne, with a view looking east to Paris.

The History:

The Gondi family acquired the Hotel d’Aulnay on this site in the 1570s. They were an Italian banking family who came to France with Catherine de Medici’s entourage.  In 1658 it was purchased by “Monsieur” Philippe of France, who was Duke of Orleans and Louis XIV’s younger brother, for 240,000 livres. The duke engaged Antoine Le Pautre as architect, who designed the building as seen in this view.  André Le Notre redesigned the gardens, which survive as a public park.  In 1785 Louis XVI bought Saint-Cloud from Louis-Philippe, the then current duke of Orleans, for Marie-Antoinette.  The price was 6,000,000 livres. Marie-Antoinette did some exterior rebuilding in the short time left to her.  Under both Napoleon I and Napoleon III it was a primary imperial residence. In 1870, during the Franco-Prussian War, the Prussians used the high ground at the chateau to bombard Paris.  Return fire from the French set the chateau ablaze, leaving only a burned-out ruin.  It was finally demolished in 1891.

The Technology:

Vues d'Optique, optical views, were designed to provide a perception of depth from a single two-dimensional engraving.  They were viewed through a zograscope, also known as an "optical diagonal machine," by which the user looked through a large magnifying lens into a mirror in which the image was reflected. Techniques such as exaggerated perspective, brighter foreground colors, magnification of the subject matter and tight framing of the field of vision served to disrupt the viewers perception of a two-dimensional image and helped to draw the viewer into the scene.  

 

It did not provide the kind of 3D experience afforded by the stereoscopic photography that replaced it in the mid 1800s, but from about 1750 until the advent of photography it was a popular home entertainment for the well-to-do.  It offered a greater sense of presence in views of foreign places and sights than one could experience in images on walls or in books. Titles are often seen in multiple languages under the image, with a single title mirrored in reverse above it so that one could read it in a viewer.The second image shown here is reversed.

  • Condition: Used
  • Condition: Very good condition. Some darkening of paper in margins; small stain at right edge, outside image area.
  • Artist: Daumont
  • Type: Print
  • Year of Production: circa 1780
  • Style: vue d'optique
  • Theme: Royal Residences
  • Features: Hand Tinted
  • Production Technique: Copper Engraving
  • Subject: Architecture

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