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| Louis XV (1710–1774) as a Child |
Artist:After Hyacinthe Rigaud (French, Perpignan 1659–1743 Paris)
Date:ca. 1716–24
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:77 x 55 1/2 in. (195.6 x 141 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Purchase, Mary Wetmore Shively Bequest, in memory of her husband, Henry L. Shively, M.D., 1960
Louis XV succeeded to the throne of France in 1715 upon the death of his great-grandfather, Louis XIV, who had reigned for more than seventy years. The five-year-old boy was the only surviving son of Louis, duc de Bourgogne, and Marie Adélaïde de Savoie, both of whom had died of smallpox in 1712. The canvas is one of many versions of Rigaud’s first official portrait of Louis XV, which was commissioned by the regent, the duc d’Orléans, for the palace of Versailles.
Catalogue Entry
Louis XV was the great-grandson of Louis XIV (1638–1715). He was born to Marie Adélaïde de Savoie (1685–1712) and Louis, duc de Bourgogne (1682–1712) on February 15, 1710 at Versailles. The succession appeared secure. However the king’s heir, Louis, called le Grand Dauphin, died the following year, and then his grandson, the duc de Bourgogne, with Marie Adélaïde and the older of their two boys, succumbed to smallpox in the winter of 1712 leaving a son aged two. On the death of Louis XIV on September 1, 1715, he therefore became king as a child of five, while Louis XIV’s nephew, Philippe d’Orléans (1674–1723), assumed the regency. In October 1722 the coronation took place and on the king’s birthday in 1723, the regency ended.
French monarchs were crowned at Reims cathedral in a ceremony called the "sacre". The costume was that worn by Louis XIV in his famous standing portrait of 1701 (Musée du Louvre, Paris): white hose, a blue velvet mantle strewn with gold fleurs-de-lis and lined with ermine, and the collar and cross of the order of the Saint-Esprit. The regalia depicted are the sword and crown, and the scepter terminating in a fleur-de-lis. Rigaud shows the boy Louis XV in that costume. In addition to the crown, sword, and scepter with the fleur-de-lis, the scepter terminating in an ivory hand, the so-called hand of justice, lies beside him. The red drapery and tassels and the floor coverings are also similar.
This canvas is one of many versions of Rigaud’s first official portrait of Louis XV, which was commissioned in the autumn of 1715 by the duc d’Orléans for the palace of Versailles, where it remains. Rigaud was taken up first by the Orléans family and then became a favorite of both the old king and the new one. Born in the south, he studied with Jean Ranc (1634–1716) in Montpellier and then in Lyons before traveling to Paris to enter the school of the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture in 1681. By 1700 he had been admitted as both portrait painter and history painter and he rose steadily, becoming rector and director in 1733. Rigaud devoted his career almost exclusively to court portraiture and had a busy studio.
Katharine Baetjer 2012
Copyright Image
https://images.metmuseum.org
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