Tea at Trianon: Van Gogh's Inspiration

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Monday, September 5, 2011

Van Gogh's Inspiration

The mystery of two windows solved at last. (Via Hermes.)

Dutchman van Gogh, who was deeply religious, saw the designs at Cottier and Company when he was working for a clergyman and wrote to his brother Theo about them.

He wrote: 'I saw sketches for two church windows. In the middle of one of the windows the portrait of an elderly lady, such a noble face, with the words 'Thy will be done' inscribed above.

'In the other window, the portrait of her daughter, with the words 'Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.'

It is thought that the windows were put up in the small church around the time of the 8th Earl's death in 1784.

When van Gogh became famous in the 20th century, his correspondence was pored over by experts but none could work out what designs he was referring to. Mr Donnelly put two and two together when he was writing an article about the stained glass of Daniel Cottier and saw pictures of the windows from St Andrew's. It reminded him of the reference by van Gogh in his letter and inspired him to do further research to see if they were the right windows. (Read entire article.)