Rococo

◍ Open on the globe

c. 1730 – 1770 · Europe · painting, architecture, decorative arts, sculpture · origin: Paris

Baroque moved from the state hall to the boudoir: asymmetric shell-work, pastels and playful love

How to recognise it

• asymmetric shell-like rocaille scrolls
• white and gold walls with pastel tints
• stucco spilling from walls onto ceilings
• gallant park scenes, swings and cupids
• mirrors and thin curving frames

Why it emerged

After Louis XIV died in 1715 the nobility left Versailles for Paris and fitted out intimate town houses instead of state enfilades. Aristocrats and tax-farmers wanted private pleasure rather than royal grandeur.

Examples

Pilgrimage to Cythera1717 · Antoine WatteauThe Academy created a new genre for it, the fête galante, the seed of all Rococo paintingThe Swing1767 · Jean-Honoré FragonardA private commission for a risqué scene, now shorthand for ancien régime frivolityWieskirche1745–1754 · Dominikus ZimmermannA rural church where stucco and fresco merge into one luminous space; UNESCO siteAmalienburg1734–1739 · François de CuvilliésHunting lodge with a silvered Hall of Mirrors, the benchmark of German court RococoSanssouci1745–1747 · Georg Wenzeslaus von KnobelsdorffFrederick the Great's 'carefree' summer palace, a single storey above vineyard terraces

How it spread

• 1730 Paris
• 1734 Munich
• 1745 Potsdam
• 1745 Wies, Bavaria
• 1747 Queluz, near Lisbon

Meanwhile elsewhere

• Ife and Benin bronzes Africa
• Ming and Qing Porcelain Asia
• Mughal Art Asia
• Baroque Europe
• Latin American Baroque Americas
• Ukiyo-e Asia
• Elizabethan Baroque Eastern Europe & Russia
• Neoclassicism Europe

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