Louis XVII (1785-1795) et le couple Simon dans la prison du Temple

JULIEN LÉOPOLD DIT JULES BOILLY (PARIS 1796-1874)
Louis XVII (1785-1795) et le couple Simon dans la prison du Temple
huile sur toile, sur sa toile d'origine
67,8 x 56,4 cm (26¹¹⁄₁₆ x 22³⁄₁₆ in.)

Collection Wildenstein ; sa vente [Collection de Monsieur X...], hôtel Drouot, Paris, 19 mai 1911, lot 9 (comme 'Louis-Léopold Boilly' - avec mention d'une signature).
Ancienne collection du comte Jacques de Vienne (1874-1965), président de la Société Hippique Française, Paris ;
Resté depuis par descendance dans la famille.

G. Lenôtre, Romances of the French Revolution, Londres, 1908 (trad. F. Lees), I, p. 221, sous la note 2 (comme 'Boilly').
G. Lenôtre, Vieilles maisons, vieux papiers, Paris, 1948, deuxième série, n.p. (comme 'un tableau inédit de Boilly'), détail reproduit en noir et blanc.
P. Marmottan, Le peintre Louis Boilly (1761-1845), Paris, 1913, p. 235 (comme 'tableau fort beau de qualité, qui, selon nous, ne doit être qu'attribué au maître').

JULIEN LÉOPOLD, CALLED JULES BOILLY (1796-1874), LOUIS XVII (1785-1795) THE SIMONS IN THE TEMPLE PRISON, OIL ON CANVAS, UNLINED

Similarly to the portraits of his mother Marie-Antoinette (1755-1793), the way in which artists chose to depict Louis XVII (1785-1795) tells us a great deal about changes in the perception of history over time. While Louis XVII was first depicted in counter-revolutionary images extolling the hopes of a future King, later representations portrayed him as a child martyr, his innocence shattered by the violence of adults.

Arrested with his parents, he was imprisoned in the Temple prison on 13 August 1792. On the death of his father Louis XVI, 21 January 1793 (1754-1793), he was proclaimed Louis XVII by the Count of Provence, the future Louis XVIII (1755-1824). Between February and June 1793, surveillance of the Dauphin was reduced and outsiders were allowed into the prison. It was at this point that Joseph Marie Vien (1716-1809) painted the portrait that would come to define the iconography of the young prince for future painters (Musée Carnavalet, Paris, inv. no. P.1403).

Skinny, with long chestnut hair, the fringe falling over his forehead, and unusually pale, the figure in our painting echoes the attitudes established a few decades earlier by his contemporaries. Standing gravely before the shoemaker Antoine Simon (1736-1794) and his wife, the delicate Louis XVII is shown in stark contrast to the caricatural figures of his of his jailers. It is possible that the painting was executed in response to an engraving that was widely circulated at the time, depicting Louis XVII sitting on his father's lap and listening to a lesson he was giving him while they were both in captivity (anonymous after Jean Philippe Guy Le Gentil (1750-1824), comte de Paroy, Louis seize s'occupe de l'éducation de son fils dans la tour du Temple).

The tenderness of the last moments spent with his father contrasts greatly with the harsh images of his imprisonment. This depiction reflects the gradual shift in the early 19th Century from a political climate to an emotional, almost Romantic treatment of the theme. The Prince's childhood, torn between upsetting events, is reminiscent of Cosette at the hands of the Thénardiers in Hugo's Les Misérables, which may have been vaguely inspired by the Dauphin's plight. Boilly places a few contemporary details in this scene to anchor it in the climate of the moment, while at the same time emphasising a certain pathos that would endure into the second half of the 19th Century. Including a letter from Robespierre (1758-1794) placed on the hearth, a newspaper bearing the Republican motto ‘liberté, égalité, fraternité’ (liberty, equality, fraternity) on the masthead, and a crumpled letter on the floor (signed ‘Louis’, or addressed to a Louis? ), which had been used to cushion the jailer's pipe, these are reminiscent of the sarcastic wit of the artist's father, Louis-Léopold Boilly (1761-1845).