Art Of The Day Weekly
#519 - from 14 June 2018 to 20 June 2018
Cotelle, the forgotten champion of gardens
VERSAILLES – Who, today, would commission 21 paintings from a painter, each representing a grove in his garden, with the object of exhibiting them in a 53-meter long gallery? Only a crazy man! And yet, one man did just that some time ago. A person for whom nothing was impossible or too beautiful: it was Louis XIV. The painter was famous at the time, today no one remembers his name: Jean Cotelle (1646-1708). But the venue he decorated in this manner (the Petit Trianon) and his paintings still exist, and offer an interesting parable on the risks of celebrity. The castle of Versailles has decided to celebrate him grandly – by dedicating an exhibition to him, and by re-flowering the gardens according to the instructions taken from his paintings. Cotelle was a roving painter- having made the famous journey to Italy, decorating the Town Hall in Marseille, inventing ephemeral settings in Avignon – and deserves all our attention. He blends in perfectly with our renewed taste for gardens.
• Jean Cotelle, des jardins et des dieux at the Grand Trianon, from 12 June to 16 September 2018.