nm0097: okay i'll i'll begin then [0.3] and [0.2] er just for a bit of 
atmosphere if you feel you want to break into spontaneous applause [laughter] 
throw flowers cheers of bravo [0.5] rush up for my autograph any of that feel 
free [1.3] so [0.4] today we're turning to landscape and representations of the 
rural [0.3] having concentrated on Paris for the last few weeks [0.4] and i 
want to begin by making [0.5] a general [0.2] but i think a highly significant 
point [0.5] that underpins [0.3] the bulk of landscape production in nineteenth 
century France [0.2] and indeed elsewhere as well [0.3] and it's this [1.2] 
landscapes are produced in [0.3] and for [0.5] the city [1.4] landscape is an 
essentially [0.2] urban genre [1.0] and wherever artists may physically paint 
their pictures [0.6] which is of course very often in urban studios [0.6] the 
controlling institutions [0.8] er audiences exhibitions dealers [0.9] all 
belong to Paris or Rome or London or some other large urban centre [1.2] and 
indeed one might say that [0.8] the very idea of the rural [0.3] the very idea 
of the city [0.3] is construc-, er s-, of of the country i beg your pardon is 
constructed in [0.3] the city [4.3] now 
since the end of the seventeenth century [0.5] French academic art theory had 
distinguished between two kinds of landscape [1.3] firstly [0.3] historical 
landscape [0.3] or paysage historique [1.5] and secondly rural landscape [0.5] 
or paysage champêtre [2.3] the first of these categories historical landscape 
[0.4] is best represented by the two great [0.2] seventeenth century masters of 
the genre [0.8] Poussin and Claude [0.5] and here we've got on the right [0.4] 
by Claude [0.2] which is just spelled [0.2] like the name Claude [0.5] er The 
Judgement of Paris [3.1] and on the left [0.5] Poussin's [0.4] landscape [0.7] 
with Orpheus and Euridice [0.4] or Euridice [0.4] and they're both from about 
the middle of the seventeenth century [2.2] and you can see [0.3] what function 
the landscape has here it's [0.5] basically an arena a setting [0.2] which 
includes some of the elements of history painting [0.8] a mythological or 
sometimes a biblical subject [0.6] classical architecture [0.3] an episode from 
ancient history [0.9] whatever [1.0] so that's historical landscape [1.4] the 
second category [0.9] paysage champêtre or rural landscape [0.6] was 
used to refer to [0.2] something like this the image on the right [0.4] which 
is a seventeenth century Dutch [0.2] landscape [0.5] by Ruisdael [0.2] and 
that's spelled R-U-I-S- [0.5] D-A-E-L [1.1] it's just called Landscape [1.8] 
and [0.2] as you can see in the comparison here [0.5] there seem to be fewer 
rules it's a more casual or more s-, straightforward look [0.4] at nature [2.9] 
this distinction between historical and rural [0.2] is very much in operation 
in the early part of the nineteenth century [0.7] and the story that i'm going 
to be telling in the next [0.3] er three lectures [0.5] is [0.3] of [1.0] the 
[0.2] original primacy of historical landscape [0.3] the way that's gradually 
undermined [0.2] by the ascendance of rural landscape [0.7] er and the way then 
that changes to introduce new forms of landscape [0.3] so this is in a way the 
first instalment of [0.3] a trilogy [3.5] now in the Academy [0.4] the powerful 
ruling body of French art [1.3] who organize training and production [0.7] as 
we know landscape wasn't considered [0.2] particularly [0.2] worthy as a genre 
[0.7] and in the hierarchy of res-, of genres you'll remember [0.2] it trails 
behind history painting and 
portrait painting and animal painting [0.2] so it's quite low down [0.7] in 
this sort of hierarchy [2.0] one [0.5] the shining examples of [0.2] Claude and 
Poussin [0.9] gave landscape [0.2] quite an eminent history [0.7] the genre was 
[0.4] insufficient in two main respects [1.3] firstly [0.4] landscape was seen 
as less morally elevating [0.4] than history painting [1.0] images like these 
[0.4] this is a [0.2] a painting by an artist called Drouais [1.6] and it's 
called Marius at Minternae [0.2] from seventeen-eighty-six a bit of [0.2] Roman 
history [0.8] and on the [1.0] right on your right here [0.2] Ingres' painting 
from eighteen-o-one [0.5] Achilles Receiving the Ambassadors of Agamemnon [1.7] 
and i just put those up as examples of [0.5] history painting [0.3] the most 
elevated kind [1.0] so landscape can't fulfil the same moral and didactic [0.2] 
functions [0.2] as images like this according to the Academy [0.2] that's the 
first problem with it [0.9] secondly [0.2] and a kind of corollary of that [0.
9] the landscape artist was viewed as less erudite [3.0] a landscape painting 
like [0.4] the Ruisdael for instance [0.6] would seem to show no signs of 
scholarship [0.5] no signs of [0.3] ethical subtlety [0.3] no signs of 
antiquarian learning [1.2] and the Academy was very keen on promoting the idea 
of the artist as [0.3] a learned scholarly [0.2] professional [3.1] so 
landscape deficient [0.3] both because it wasn't [0.4] elevated and moral 
enough [0.2] and because the artist who produced it [0.5] wasn't scholarly [0.
5] enough himself [0.8] but it's worth mentioning that in spite of this [0.6] 
er [0.4] huge numbers of landscapes were produced [0.3] and all the way through 
the eighteen-tens eighteen-twenties and into the eighteen-thirties [0.5] as 
many of a third as a third of all entries in the Salon would be landscapes [0.
4] so of all the artists in Paris [0.6] a third of them [0.2] would at any time 
probably be painting [0.4] landscapes so it was a popular genre nonetheless [1.
7] now there were considerable attempts [0.5] at the end of the eighteenth and 
in the early nineteenth centuries [0.6] to revive the flagging fortunes of 
historical landscape [0.7] to elevate it and raise its status both [0.3] 
aesthetically and institutionally [1.6] and academicians [0.3] started a kind 
of 
campaign i suppose to [0.5] position the landscape painter as being a learned 
and morally forceful figure [0.3] just like his colleague who painted history 
painting [1.0] and the key figure behind this [0.4] campaign [0.7] is an artist 
called Pierre-Henri [0.2] de Valenciennes [0.3] and his name is spelled V-A-L- 
[0.7] E-N- [0.5] C-I-E- [0.4] double-N-E-S and he's a landscape specialist 
who's working [0.2] around the turn of the nineteenth century [1.5] and here's 
a couple of his images [0.5] this is from seventeen-ninety-three [0.2] it's 
called Mercury and Argus 
nm0097: this is Ideal Landscape [0.5] with Washerwomen [1.9] from eighteen-o-
seven [2.5] but more important than Valenciennes' painting [0.5] was a textbook 
he published in eighteen-hundred [0.3] called Elements of Practical Perspective 
[1.5] which proved to be a very influential work right the way through the 
nineteenth century [2.1] in his book Valenciennes defended [0.2] the practice 
of landscape [1.2] er but he didn't actually try and subvert the academic 
hierarchy [0.3] his defence was mounted very much within a standard sort of 
academic [0.3] framework [2.1] and he used the conventional split between 
historic and [0.2] rural landscape [0.3] as the basis of his argument [1.8] and 
what he wanted to do was consolidate [0.4] a separate hierarchy [0.3] within 
the genre of landscape so just as the Academy worked with an idea of [0.4] a 
hierarchy of genres from the most elevated to the least elevated [1.3] 
Valenciennes wanted to take landscape and create [0.4] an internal hierarchy [0.
2] to the genre [1.8] with [0.4] paysage historique at the top [1.8] 
Valenciennes claimed that there were two ways of looking at nature [0.5] and he 
says and i'm quoting now from his book [1.4] the first [0.6] is that in which 
we see nature as it is [0.5] and represented and represented as faithfully as 
possible [1.5] according to this procedure [0.3] one eliminates objects that 
don't seem interesting enough [0.4] brings forward others that fit [0.5] even 
though they might be far away [0.4] looks for harmonies and contrasts [0.2] 
and finally chooses this or that view [0.2] because it's more pleasing and 
picturesque [1.3] the second [0.7] is that in which we see nature as it ought 
to be [0.6] and in the way [0.2] enriched imagination [0.3] presents the view 
to the eyes of man [0.3] of genius [0.5] who has seen much [0.2] composed 
carefully [0.5] and analysed and reflected [0.2] upon the choice that one must 
make [2.1] so he's [0.9] talking about nature as it is [0.5] as opposed to 
nature as it ought to be the real [0.3] and the ideal [1.4] and it's this 
latter category of course the ideal [0.2] nature as it ought to be [0.3] that 
Valenciennes holds up as the higher [1.9] not only for him does it resemble 
history painting [0.4] in its visual and moral perfection [1.0] but he gives 
the painter of such a picture [0.5] a very specific identity [0.9] and in his 
book he makes it clear that the artist who paints [0.4] historical landscape [0.
5] will have read the poets [0.4] by which he means [0.4] er the great 
classical poets like Homer and Virgil [1.0] er [0.3] the painter of paysage hi-,
historique will be able to distinguish specific customs and costumes [0.6] 
historical and archaeological 
detail that he'll have gleaned from reading [0.6] well again Homer Xenophon [0.
2] Pausanias [0.4] Roman historians as well [2.1] and the [0.2] painter of 
paysage historique says Valenciennes [0.4] will also understand the ethical and 
philosophical implications of his work [1.2] so in other words Valenciennes is 
presenting an image of the historical landscape painter [0.3] as exactly this 
kind of scholarly [0.4] professional [1.2] while the rural painter [0.5] is 
perhaps more like an artisan [1.1] historical landscape requires intellect [1.
0] the other requires less highbrow faculties [3.2] now it's clear i think from 
this particular defence of landscape [0.5] that [1.0] various forms of the 
genre [1.1] are invested with specific [0.2] identities [0.2] and in particular 
i think there's an issue here about class [0.4] and institutional status [0.4] 
which we might er [0.4] er [0.6] exemplify as [0.3] the professional [0.3] 
versus the artisan [1.2] interestingly though this division also maps onto a 
kind of geographical [0.5] division [1.6] the professional historical landscape 
painter [0.4] is connected to a southern tradition [1.8] of the Italian 
landscape [0.3] which stretches back to Roman history [0.7] and Greek history 
[1.8] while the more artisanal [0.4] rural landscape painter [0.3] belongs to a 
northern tradition [0.2] exemplified by Dutch and Flemish artists [2.7] so 
there's Valenciennes the most articulate [0.5] of [0.3] the defenders of the 
genre [0.7] and the redefinition of [0.2] er [0.5] its function [1.0] and 
here's just one more image by him [0.5] er this is just called Arcadian 
Landscape [0.4] from around the turn of the century [4.9] now academic 
landscape received another huge boost in eighteen-seventeen [0.7] when it was 
announced that in parallel [0.2] with the annual Prix de Rome for history 
painting [0.5] there would be a Prix de Rome [0.2] for landscape painting [0.2] 
to be held every four years [1.9] the Prix de Rome was the most important 
competition [0.4] in [0.3] academic [0.2] art education [1.4] every two years a 
subject was set from [0.2] either the classics or the Bible [1.1] and every 
student entering it [0.4] had to paint a picture [0.5] of that [0.2] theme [1.
2] and the student who was judged to have delivered the best rendition of it [0.
5] was sent to work 
and study [0.3] in Rome [0.4] which at the turn of the nineteenth century was 
the Mecca of the art world [2.6] the Prix de Rome for landscape [0.2] was to 
work the same way except it would be every four years but again there would be 
a s-, [0.4] a subject set [0.4] students would enter [0.3] and the winner would 
go off to Rome to study in [0.3] Italy [1.7] and [0.5] there we are [0.5] so 
i'll just put up this as a [0.4] kind of visual memento [0.2] this is by 
Cogniet [0.8] whose painting we looked at you remember in the seminars a few 
weeks ago [0.5] this is called The Artist in his Room at Rome [1.9] from 
eighteen-seventeen [0.3] and it shows Cogniet who's just arrived from Paris [0.
5] with a rather [0.7] nice Italian landscape [0.8] out of the window [4.4] 
Rome [0.3] visiting Italy was considered crucial [0.2] to the development of an 
artist [0.9] it was the home of antiquity [0.4] Roman antiquity [0.5] it was 
also the home of course of the great masters most notably Raphael [0.5] whom 
the French Academy [0.5] absolutely er deified [1.5] and it was felt that [0.3] 
the artist needed to go and study these works first hand [0.9] and to 
absorb the artistic ambience [0.2] of Rome [3.0] here's two examples of French 
landscape painters working in Rome [0.8] one an unfinished sketch the other a 
highly finished picture [0.7] er [0.2] both showing one of [0.3] the French 
artists' favourite subjects the Colosseum [0.8] the image on the right [0.3] 
the sketch [0.4] is by Michallon [0.7] he's spelled M-I-C-H- [0.4] A-double-L-O-
N [0.4] which is called The View of the Colosseum [1.2] from around [0.4] er [0.
8] eighteen early eighteen-twenties i think [1.5] and here on the [0.7] left [0.
7] by an artist called Bracassat [0.3] that's B-R-A- [0.3] C-A- [0.2] double-S-
A-T [0.4] the Colosseum from around eighteen-twenty [3.3] note [0.2] in the 
Bracassat [0.4] how the landmark the Colosseum [0.5] is contained within an 
ideal landscape [1.2] that's very Claudian in its composition [0.8] in its 
division between silver and shade in the foreground [0.4] and then [0.6] sort 
of this golden light on the horizon [1.7] the building the focus nestles in the 
very centre [0.3] of the image it's the focus of the image [0.4] and it's as if 
[0.4] we the viewers [0.3] are positioned as tourists coming across this [0.3] 
view [0.6] as if we sort of [0.4] 
walk down this path [0.3] and there it is spread out before us [0.8] the 
glorious Colosseum [3.3] and what's meant to be happening here [0.6] is that 
the [0.4] meaning of the architecture [0.6] is supposed to be inflecting [0.2] 
the meaning of the landscape [0.3] and vice versa [2.3] and [1.0] perhaps a [1.
2] better e-, a clearer example of what that means is this painting this is 
Valenciennes again [1.0] er The Ancient City of Agrigentum [0.4] from seventeen-
eighty-seven [4.1] and what Valenciennes is trying to do [0.3] is trying to 
imbue [0.2] the entire landscape [0.2] with the spirit of classical antiquity 
[2.7] so just as the [1.4] togas or antique dress of the figures down here [0.
5] identifies them as [1.0] antique [0.5] morally elevated [0.2] noble [1.7] 
and just as the [1.4] architecture [0.6] of these classical buildings [0.7] 
connotes [0.4] antique [0.2] grandeur [0.2] that's now been lost [1.5] so 
Valenciennes wanted the landscape itself [0.2] the very setting [0.6] to be 
imbued with these same ideas of [0.3] moral worth [1.0] grandeur [0.6] 
elevation [1.4] a sort of an ethical force [2.9] so they're trying to make the 
landscape itself [1.1] connote some 
kind of moral [0.4] value [2.8] so [0.4] what kind of work [0.2] would get a 
student to Italy [0.8] well here are two winners [0.3] of the Prix de Rome for 
landscape [1.5] on the right [0.5] the very first winner from eighteen-
seventeen [0.6] Michallon again [0.6] and this is Democritus and the Abderites 
[1.5] quite what's going on i don't know i have to say i [0.3] have to confess 
ignorance and say i don't even know who the Abderites were [1.1] er [1.9] but 
if you're that interested i'm sure there's a book in the library somewhere and 
if you find out you can tell me [1.1] er on the left by an artist called 
Buttura [0.3] B-U-double-T-U-R-A [2.1] this is the winner of eighteen-thirty-
seven [1.3] Apollo Attending his Flocks [3.2] and i think they are both good 
examples of the kind of work that was demanded [0.5] classical subjects [0.2] 
very highly finished very smooth surfaces [0.6] and very highly composed very 
sort of artificially put together [0.8] the similarity of composition [0.5] 
should be immediate at once i think the same device of [0.3] trees as framing 
motifs [1.3] and also note in both the 
trees are used to construct space [2.3] the tree [0.6] at the front marks the 
[0.5] frontal plane [1.1] there's another tree or a s-, bit of foliage further 
back which marks a middle plane [0.5] and then there's a kind of horizon line 
which marks a [0.2] er [0.5] a plane at the back so there's this sort of planar 
construction [0.5] to create space [1.1] it's the same here [0.9] frontal plane 
[0.8] middle plane and then the backdrop [0.3] almost as if they're sort of [0.
2] backdrops in a stage set [5.1] highly er conventional [1.6] er this is [0.5] 
clearly [0.3] a [0.2] Claudian or Poussinesque Poussinesque [0.6] er device [1.
5] there for instance is Claude's landscape with Isaac and Rebecca [2.8] er and 
you can see at once that the debt to Claude [0.4] in terms of composition [0.3] 
is enormous [1.5] in terms of the [0.6] er [0.2] planar organization [0.3] also 
in the structure of light that became very traditional [0.4] darks in the 
foreground [0.3] emphasizing the framing motifs [0.8] and then [0.2] becoming 
systematically lighter [0.4] towards the horizon [1.4] and again that's a way 
of creating space it's what's known as aerial [0.2] perspective [1.0] create a 
sense of recession [0.6] by moving from dark [0.9] to light [1.1] at the first 
point 
nm0097: so [1.1] works like this winners of the Prix de Rome [0.7] er 
displaying their learning [1.0] full of intellectual investment [1.4] showing 
off classicizing tendency [0.4] and also very consciously [0.4] using [0.6] 
seventeenth century French models the idea of a great national style [1.1] and 
of course in the nineteenth century many people were looking back [0.3] to the 
seventeenth century as a kind of French golden age [0.5] so clearly there's 
someth-, something invested here [0.3] to do with national identity and sort of 
the [0.3] French cultural prowess [5.2] now you've seen how conventional [0.3] 
these compositions are [1.0] how much they conform to templates [0.8] from [0.
4] Claude and Poussin [1.0] and of course what that alerts us to at once [0.5] 
is that these are studio paintings [0.6] 
it's as if the artists haven't gone out and copied nature [0.9] but they've 
merely gone into the Louvre or another art gallery [0.3] and copied other 
paintings [0.9] what they're representing is not the world outside [0.4] but 
they're representing other representations [1.9] but we shouldn't infer from 
this [0.2] that study for nature wasn't undertaken [0.2] by these artists [0.6] 
one often comes across accounts [0.2] er [0.5] in sort of [0.2] a lot of survey 
books of nineteenth century French art for instance [0.8] which declare that [0.
5] it was the Barbizon painters or even the Impressionists who were the first 
to go out and paint [0.6] in the open [0.7] to make studies in the open air [1.
1] but by the turn of the nineteeenth century [0.8] plein air landscape study 
and plein air just means in the open air [0.6] was a very common [0.8] academic 
practice [0.5] and again it was one that Valenciennes [0.4] had particularly 
encouraged [3.0] and here are [2.9] a couple of [0.2] studies [0.4] done plein 
air [0.2] by Valenciennes [1.0] here's another little quotation from his 
treatise [0.3] The [0.4] er Elements of Practical Perspective 
from eighteen-hundred [1.4] he says quote [1.1] my student has drawn under my 
direction for some months [0.7] he's copied several paintings of the best 
masters [0.4] but he has not yet looked at nature [0.8] he must study it [0.5] 
and when the weather is fine [0.2] we go into the country together [0.7] there 
i give him my views on how to make studies [0.4] that may serve him later [0.4] 
in composing pictures [1.1] well that [0.4] short quotation i think is very 
dense [0.4] and reme-, reveals a lot about the workings of the academic 
landscape [0.7] and there are three particular things i'd like to [0.2] 
emphasize about that [1.1] firstly of course [1.0] simply that Valenciennes [0.
4] er [0.5] stresses the importance [0.2] of looking at nature and of making 
these sketches [0.5] en plein air [0.2] in the open [0.7] and here's two he did 
in Rome from the seventeen-se seventies [0.5] this is just known as Roofs in 
Sunlight [1.4] and on the 
other side on the right [0.2] Study of Roman Sky [1.5] so these are examples of 
Valenciennes himself in Rome [0.5] sitting outside with his paints and easel [1.
0] and [1.3] sketching details atmospheric effects and so forth [2.6] secondly 
[1.5] we should note [0.3] that Valenciennes thinks of these sketches as raw 
materials [0.2] to be used later [0.2] in a composition [1.1] he says studies 
[0.3] that will serve one later in composing pictures [0.5] so it's almost as 
if [0.7] these images [0.3] are part of something like a renaissance model book 
a compendium of [0.2] skies lighting effects natural elements foliage or so 
forth [0.4] that the artist can refer back to [0.4] when he's back in his 
studio [0.8] and build up [0.7] a more formal composition from them [1.5] and 
of course what we witnessing there [0.3] is the transition from nature as it is 
[0.4] to nature as it should be [0.4] from the empirical [0.5] like this [0.4] 
to the ideal [0.7] like those Prix de Rome winners [2.8] so that's the second i 
think important thing [1.4] point vale-, Valenciennes makes about plein air 
painting [1.6] thirdly [0.9] i think we should note that [0.2] 
the process only takes place [0.5] after a lengthy period of instruction [1.5] 
he began by saying [0.2] my student has drawn under my direction for some 
months [1.5] so the student has already copied other paintings [0.5] copied 
other prints [0.4] and only then will Valenciennes take him out into the open 
air [0.5] with his paints and [0.7] er a sketchbook [1.9] which again reminds 
us that academic landscape begins with other representations [3.9] and i think 
what's going on here is that the student Valenciennes' students students in the 
Academy whoever it may be [0.7] are somehow being inculcated [0.6] are being 
taught [0.4] how they ought to look at nature [0.6] they are given preformed 
modes of visual [0.2] experience pre-, predetermined ways of looking at [0.5] 
and apprehending nature [1.5] so it's as if [0.3] Valenciennes [0.2] and other 
teachers [0.3] want to mediate [0.7] the way their students look at [0.3] 
nature [1.5] and [0.5] i suppose influence [0.7] how they see it [0.2] and how 
they represent it [1.9] well of course in a sense [0.3] no visual experience 
escapes that kind of mediation [0.6] we can't see 
anything in a pure way [1.0] you know what we see around it is always preceded 
by our knowledge [0.3] our preconceptions our prejudices [0.6] by other 
representations we've seen other things we've assimilated and learned about [0.
8] there can be no [0.4] er direct observation [0.3] detached from our [0.7] 
intellectual [0.3] and perceptual make-up [1.9] but what's striking here [0.6] 
is the way that the process of artistic production [0.2] the process of making 
a picture [0.6] is structured [0.2] so deliberately with representations [0.7] 
preceding [0.4] the raw material [1.1] with pictures [0.3] preceding nature [1.
6] and of course what it means is that the moment the student steps outside the 
studio [0.2] and goes and looks [0.7] at [0.8] a river a pond [0.2] er a tree 
whatever it is [1.4] he already sees it in terms of landscape traditions [0.3] 
in terms of pastoral traditions [0.5] in terms of other kinds of painting [2.8] 
and also [0.6] he will also view nature [0.4] as [0.5] something bucolic [0.4] 
picturesque [0.3] jolly [0.6] or something noble [0.3] and moralizing [1.9] so 
the landscapes he produces [0.3] are firmly set within [0.4] what one might 
call [0.3] 
ideological frames [5.1] now in making that claim [1.2] that there's something 
about [0.2] academic landscapes [0.2] that's [0.2] ideological [1.0] i'm 
parting company [0.2] with i think many of the books [0.3] you'll read [3.7] 
for instance [0.3] if you've looked at Peter Galassi's book Corot in Italy 
which i put on the reading list [1.0] you might have read this [0.2] Galassi 
says of academic landscape [0.2] quote [1.2] if for history painters [0.7] 
antiquity was fraught with passion and conflict [0.4] dense with urgent analogy 
[0.2] to contemporary affairs [0.7] for Valenciennes and his school [0.4] the 
classical past [0.2] was a dreamland of tranquillity [2.5] so Galassi seems to 
be claiming that history painting is all about [0.5] drama and morality [0.7] 
but that [0.3] historical landscape [0.2] is just a kind of [0.5] lovely 
utopian dreamland [0.2] that's not really about anything in particular [1.2] 
and he also seems to make the p-, [0.7] claim that [0.6] history painting [0.2] 
is very loaded [0.2] with [0.5] political [0.3] and [0.2] ideological 
significance [0.8] but [0.3] historical landscape had none of that [2.2] i 
would claim [0.7] that Galassi overlooks some 
important [0.7] dimensions to the argument [2.4] firstly [0.7] as i've 
suggested [0.7] i think he overlooks [0.2] the relationship between [0.5] 
landscape [0.7] and [0.7] what one might call cultural power [0.8] knowledge 
and learning [1.2] and [0.2] er [3.5] the er [0.3] the moral [0.3] contents of 
[0.3] intellectual endeavour [2.6] in other words the very pleasure derived 
from historical landscapes [0.6] is bound up with a certain cultural and social 
status [1.0] they were painted for [0.4] an elite [0.4] with elite tastes who 
could go [0.3] and exercise their own scholarship by identifying [0.2] 
Democritus [0.4] by identifying the Abderites and unlike me [0.3] being able to 
say who they were [1.7] so i think that's the first point [3.5] secondly [1.2] 
consider this [0.2] quotation from Valenciennes [2.0] and [0.7] he's talking 
about the work of an artist called Gaspard Dughet [0.7] often just known as 
Gaspard [0.9] and he's represented on the right there [1.6] i think [1.2] yes 
[0.6] er this is an ideal landscape of his [0.3] from [0.5] again the mid-
seventeenth century [1.1] this is what Valenciennes says about Gaspard [0.2] 
quote [1.4] his works quite simply offer landscapes [0.4] 
in which one might desire to have a house [0.6] for it would be situated with a 
beautiful view [0.8] one could breathe in the coolness at midday [0.5] one 
might walk along the shady banks of the river [0.4] or lose oneself in the 
thickness of a forest [0.3] and give oneself over [0.3] to sentimental reveries 
[2.1] i think that's very interesting and it's a very interesting clue [0.2] to 
how Valenciennes reads images [0.3] like the one on the right [0.7] and he 
reads them in terms of a personal [0.3] appropriation [0.4] of landscape [1.9] 
he began after all by [0.2] staking his claim on property [0.3] it's where you 
might like to have a house [1.3] and then he s-, [0.2] evoked that s-, sort of 
er set of [0.4] conventional leisure activities [1.0] going into a forest 
walking along a river [0.6] dreaming [0.2] as you're wandering through the 
beauties of nature [2.6] what's happening here [0.2] is nicely summed up [0.5] 
by [1.0] er this quotation [0.2] this comes from a book by a geographer called 
Denis Cosgrove [0.9] and it's from a work called Social Formation [0.4] and 
Symbolic Landscape [0.6] which is actually terribly interesting [0.2] er if 
anyone feels brave enough to tackle it [0.8] Cosgrove says this [0.2] quote [1.
1] landscape [0.3] is an ideological concept [1.0] it represents a way in which 
certain classes of people have signified themselves in their world [0.4] 
through their imagined relationship with nature [0.9] and through which [0.3] 
they've underlined and communicated [0.3] their own social role [0.5] and that 
of others with respect to external nature [1.9] so what Cosgrove is [0.3] 
talking about is the way that people [0.7] er [0.5] construct their personal 
identity construct a sense of who they are [0.6] through their relationship 
with nature [0.9] and obviously there's a big difference between if you think 
of your relationship with nature [0.4] in terms of being [0.4] a landowner [0.
5] an owner of a house in woods that you can stroll in [0.6] or if you sort of 
think of your relationship with nature as being one of [0.2] work [0.2] of 
having to till the soil [0.9] and so forth [1.5] er and Valenciennes certainly 
seems to have a very clear idea in that little quotation [0.3] what his 
relationship with 
nature is [0.3] and the kind of personal identity that gives him [0.7] it's 
leisured [0.4] property owning [0.2] cultured [0.2] and mobile [1.1] so there 
again there seems to be a real [0.4] er ideological [1.0] underpinning [0.3] to 
landscape and how it's viewed [2.2] and this leads on i think to the third way 
[0.3] in which we th-, might think of [0.2] landscape [0.2] as being 
particularly this kind of academic landscape [0.5] as being [0.3] ideologically 
loaded [1.3] and it's this [0.4] that this very [0.3] pastoral mode [0.2] this 
sort of bucolic [0.6] er [0.4] mode of representing nature [0.6] is in an way a 
misreading [0.3] of rural life [0.9] it's a representation of the countryside 
[0.3] that excludes labour [0.3] it excludes peasants [0.4] it excludes poverty 
[0.5] it excludes class [1.9] and again i think there's a clear [0.4] 
ideological underpinning there it's turning nature into this kind of dreamland 
[0.9] where you're not disturbed [0.4] by any of the sort of real grubby events 
that happen out there [0.7] er [0.3] in the countryside [3.0] now in saying all 
that i'm not trying to make the claim that [0.5] er a work [0.3] like [0.3] the 
de-, [0.2] Democritus and the Abderites [0.3] is designed to circulate 
political messages 
in the same way [0.2] as Daumier for instance who we were looking at last week 
[1.0] they're not [1.0] political propaganda [0.2] they're not trying to make 
political points [1.0] but [0.5] i am trying to [0.2] argue [0.4] that there 
are certain values [0.4] certain [0.6] er ideas [1.3] and a certain idea about 
status [0.2] that's sort of built into the genre [2.1] that there is a kind of 
ideological [0.5] underpinning [2.3] er [1.0] on the other hand [0.2] you may 
agree with Peter Galassi [0.4] er [0.2] and think [0.3] i'm talking nonsense [2.
0] er [6.8] so there we've looked at [0.7] the kind of works that won the Prix 
de Rome [2.4] the kind of subjects [0.2] the kind of compositions [1.2] and 
i've argued [0.3] that [1.0] there is a political dimension to this work [0.9] 
also to be considered [1.8] and i want to end just by talking about what 
happens [0.5] to paysage historique [0.6] as we get nearer to the middle of the 
nineteenth century [3.0] and let's just have [0.9] a couple more [0.2] up [0.9] 
on the [1.2] er left here [1.3] is [0.2] a work by an artist called [0.2] 
Benouville [0.9] he's spelled B-E-N- [0.8] O-U- [0.5] V-I-double-L-E [1.5] it's 
Ulysses [0.2] and Nausicaa [1.8] again a Homeric subject [0.4] and that 
won the eighteen-forty-five competition [3.5] and on the right here [1.2] the 
winner of the eighteen-twenty-one [0.4] competition the second landscape Prix 
de Rome [0.4] by an artist called Remond [0.3] R-E-M-O-N-D [2.0] and that's The 
Rape of Proserpine [0.8] so again another well established classical [0.5] er a 
theme [4.7] er shifts in attitude [0.2] towards historical landscape [0.5] and 
its style [1.1] can be captured to some extent [0.7] by [0.4] looking at 
critical reactions [0.2] to the entries for the Prix de Rome [1.1] looking at 
how critics responded [0.3] to [0.3] the winners when they were announced [0.7] 
er each time [1.6] of course as with any documentary evidence we need to be 
quite circumspect [0.4] and remember that critics are a specialized audience [0.
3] they have agendas of their own that affect their responses [1.4] er so it's 
not as if [0.5] we can look at criticism [0.5] take a quotation and assume that 
it stands for [0.2] an entire audience or all Parisians or all French people [1.
1] but nonetheless i think to review the critical literature [0.7] what critics 
said about these works is instructive [2.0] and i 
want to point out some of the ways in which [0.4] critics' concerns changed [0.
3] between the eighteen-twenties [0.2] and [0.6] eighteen-forty-five [0.5] when 
Benouville won [3.2] so [1.5] firstly [1.0] there seemed to be [0.5] er [4.3] a 
shift [0.8] in [0.6] ideas about [0.9] how to paint [2.2] reviewing the 
finalists in eighteen-twenty-nine [1.2] the Journal des Artistes [0.6] which 
was a [0.2] an art newspaper [1.6] complained [0.4] about the sheer diversity 
[0.8] diversity of manner diversity of style diversity of treatment [2.7] this 
diversity [0.2] said the anonymous critic [0.6] was symptomatic of a lack of 
good teaching [0.3] in the École des Beaux Arts the Academy's school [1.3] 
because [0.2] quote [0.8] there is one manner [0.5] which must be better than 
the others [0.4] that is to say which is truer [0.5] closer to nature [0.4] and 
which does not exclude [0.2] the choice and arrangement demanded by good taste 
[0.6] unquote [1.3] so this critic is saying [0.2] there's a right way to paint 
landscape [0.2] one way that is superior to all others [0.3] this is what the 
Academy should be teaching people [0.4] but they're clearly not [0.7] because 
if you look at all the 
entries [0.9] they're all painting in different styles [3.6] by eighteen-forty-
five [0.2] the opposite criticism is being made [1.2] and the journal [0.2] 
L'Illustration [0.2] illustration [0.5] complained in that year [0.2] as it was 
reviewing [0.2] the finalists of the Prix de Rome [0.5] that the Academy was 
too conventional [1.9] that its rigid protocols around landscape [0.5] its 
adherence to paysage historique and the [0.4] Claudian tradition [0.4] didn't 
allow sufficient diversity [2.2] so that seems to be the first shift [0.8] in 
eighteen-twenty-nine complaining [0.3] everything's too different rather than 
sticking to the true way of doing it [0.8] in eighteen-forty-five [0.2] 
complaining that people are sticking to the true way of doing it too much [0.3] 
and there's not enough diversity [2.6] a similar switch in critical fortune [0.
2] relates to the historical subject itself [1.8] in eighteen-thirty-three [0.
6] the Journal des Artistes again [0.5] voiced some concerns about some of the 
entries [0.4] the entries was er a Homeric subject [1.8] again [0.2] from [1.0] 
the The Odyssey [2.9] what they were worried about here was 
not so much [0.2] technique [0.4] or style [0.6] but the way [0.4] that [0.2] 
the subject had been treated and in particular they found that [0.3] women [0.
2] hadn't been made pure enough [1.1] and there was a kind of a [0.8] a carping 
rant [0.4] about the way that the finalists in the Prix de Rome [0.2] hadn't 
represented the women in their antique purity [0.8] but had just painted them 
as if they were modern Parisiennes [3.2] so [0.5] there was this worry [0.6] 
that [0.6] they weren't treating the subject in quite the right way [1.6] but 
by eighteen-forty-five again there seems to be a shift [0.3] and the critics 
aren't concerned with how the subject is being treated [0.4] but with the very 
subject themselves and they're dismissing them as irrelevant [2.3] so from a 
sort of [0.3] scholarly [0.9] er [0.7] exposition of how Homer ought to be 
painted [0.5] it shifts to a lot of critics just saying why paint Homer [0.2] 
who cares [7.6] there's also i think [0.4] er [0.8] a shift [1.7] to be 
examined in terms of audience [0.5] for landscapes [2.2] and as i'll discuss 
next week [0.8] the audience for [0.2] historic [0.2] landscape declines [0.2] 
and the 
la-, and the audience for [0.2] other landscape forms particularly paysage 
champêtre [0.7] increases [2.9] and this starts to happen even in academic 
circles [3.0] and [0.2] the other great treatise on landscape from the early 
part of the century [0.8] is a case in point [0.6] and this treatise is by an 
er a writer called Deperthes [0.2] and that's spelled D-E-P- [0.7] E-R- [0.3] T-
H-E-S [0.8] and it's just called The Theory of Landscape [0.5] it was published 
in eighteen-eighteen [1.1] and i suppose comes second to Valenciennes in [0.4] 
historical importance [5.5] and Deperthes challenged Valenciennes in two ways 
[1.7] he didn't sort of try to completely undermine Valenciennes' theory [0.3] 
but there were two significant [0.4] amendments he wanted to make [1.0] firstly 
[0.3] he declared that historical landscape [0.2] and paysage champêtre [0.5] 
were equally important [3.0] so [0.2] Valenciennes had set up this hierarchy [0.
6] Deperthes says [0.2] no [0.5] both the rural and the historical modes of 
landscape [0.2] are [0.5] as good as each other [5.8] what's more i suppose is 
a corollary of that [0.3] Deperthes also [0.4] 
wanted to s-, [0.2] claim that the painter [0.2] of rural landscapes [0.3] is 
just as professional [1.4] just as artistic just as imaginative and just as 
scholarly [0.7] as the historical [0.2] landscape painter [4.0] so Deperthes 
breaks down that hierarchy [0.7] the second important [0.5] er [1.3] challenge 
he makes [0.7] is that while he affirms [0.4] that landscape [0.3] is inferior 
to history painting [1.4] he still believes that history painting is a greater 
genre [1.1] he places landscape second in the hierarchy [0.7] so he says 
history painting's the greatest [0.6] after that comes landscape [1.6] and his 
reason for doing this [0.2] very largely [0.6] was that he said landscape was 
socially more significant [0.8] because being less esoteric [1.5] being less 
archane [0.3] not dealing [0.6] with [0.7] Abderites and Ulysses and the like 
[0.7] it could appeal to a greater number of people [0.5] it would speak to a 
larger audience [6.0] so again there's an important shift there [0.3] in terms 
of audience [1.0] from [1.3] Valenciennes [0.8] placing this sort of more elite 
genre this very scholarly [0.4] kind of highbrow genre at the top [0.6] 
Deperthes is 
saying well no actually this more [0.4] general genre something that the 
bourgeoisie can go and buy and enjoy [0.7] is actually just as good [3.1] so i 
think we can [0.3] trace the decline [0.3] of historical landscape [0.6] from 
[0.6] its sort of high point in eighteen-seventeen when the [0.2] Prix de Rome 
is instituted [3.1] through the worries of the eighteen-thirties all those 
critics [1.1] concerned that [0.2] it's not being done properly [0.8] to the 
open hostility we saw [0.2] in eighteen-forty-five [1.0] and [0.2] to end with 
two [0.7] ex-, further examples of that hostility [2.5] again from the eighteen-
forty-five competition that [0.5] this painting won [1.4] the journal L'Artiste 
[0.2] the artist [0.8] called paysage os-, historique [0.3] the worst of all 
landscapes [1.1] again turning Valenciennes' hierarchy on its head [2.0] and [0.
2] L'Illustration [0.3] summed up [0.2] the whole genre with these words [0.6] 
something without truth [0.4] something without naivety [0.4] and completely 
boring [1.9] so in a sense just like Titanic [1.3] thank you er i'll end there 
[0.6] er [1.1] and as i say for the next seminar [1.1] after reading week make 
sure you read the little extract from Teno [0.3] and we'll [0.5] discuss [0.2] 
er [0.2] a bit more [0.3] about ways of making landscapes thank you