These are works by "the greatest French artist of all time," according to Louis XIV. Charles Le Brun (1619-1690).
Born in Paris, he attracted the notice of Chancellor Séguier, who placed him at the age of eleven in the studio of Simon Vouet. He was also a pupil of François Perrier.
At fifteen he received commissions from Cardinal Richelieu, in the execution of which he displayed an ability which obtained the generous commendations of Nicolas Poussin, in whose company Le Brun started for Rome in 1642
In 1663, he became director of the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture, where he laid the basis of academicism and became the all-powerful, peerless master of 17th-century French art.
He used his artistry to compare human and animal faces, later inspiring Charles Darwin to write The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals.(1872).
However, Darwin viewed this work as a cornerstone of his evolutionary theory — the means of demonstrating once and for all that Man was not a separate and divinely created species but no different from other animals.
The result was a study of expression that tried to identify specific mental and emotional states as well as their corresponding expressions.
[Physiognomy, literally the "knowledge of nature," relates to the assessment of human character through study of physical features. This concept of an inherent concordance of body and soul harks back to Antiquity, and regained currency in 17th-century thought. [The goal of physiognomy is to judge character according to features of the face.]
A number of thinkers have considered how the face reflects the workings of the mind, and ultimately the soul, and human nature. For many centuries the study of Physiognomy was tied up with astrology. Notions of the relationship between individual appearance and inner character, was present in early Greek culture.
By the fourth century, the philosopher Aristotle made frequent reference to Physiognomy. Aristotle’s considered that a man’s mental nature, as well as his passing emotional state, was revealed by his anatomic form and the play of the muscles.
The study of Physiognomy became an integral part of the physiologically based medical practice and those who study physiognomics were “physicians” who tried to interpreted human character and moral tendencies.
Analogies were drawn between human expressions (pride, humility, cowardice, bravery) and animals’ facial features. In the ancient Greek world view, the peacock was proud, the hare timorous, the lion brave.]
LeBrun studied the lines linking different points of the head in a complex geometry which revealed the faculties of the spirit or character.
Thus, the angle formed by the axis of the eyes and the eyebrows could lead to various conclusions, depending upon whether or not this angle rose toward the forehead to join the soul or descanted toward the nose and mouth, which were considered to be animal features.
Le Brun of course drew on various contemporary sources, both graphic and philosophical, two of which come immediately to mind:
G. B. Della Porta's De Humana Physiognomia had been translated into French in 1655-56, and certain of Le Brun's drawings relate closely to his Italian predecessor,
and more importantly,
René Descartes published his Passions de l'Ame in 1649, identifying the seat of the soul in the pineal gland, located at the center of the brain.
Le Brun took this as a starting point for his treatise. Elaborating a geometry that links the soul to the senses, in witness of faculties and character, he studied the lines relating the different features of the head. The angle thus formed by the eyes and the browline is here indicative of the individual's aspirations: directed upward they would be lofty and spiritual; downward to nose and mouth, the animal elements of base sensory experience, they would be vile (see Plate 1).
Thus the position and the conformation of the eyes greatly help to read the dominant passions (Cf. the demonstration in Pl. 12, where Le Brun bestows human eyes on the lion and the horse).
As related by Henri Testelin (in his 3ème Discours Académique),
"The affections of the soul follow the temperament of the body and the external marks are certain signs of the affections of the soul, that we know in the form of each animal, its mores and its complexion...
The difference between the human face and that of the brutes is that man has eyes located on the same line that traverses straight to the nerve of the ears, which leads to the sense of hearing; the brutish animals to the contrary have the eye drawing downward to the nose, following their natural affections."Testelin follows up on the geometry in animals, stating:
"It was demonstrated by a triangle that the sense impressions [i.e. feelings] of animals are borne from the nose to the ear, and from there to the heart, of which the bottom line comes to close up the angle with that of the nose; and that when this line traverses the whole eye, and that on the bottom passes through the mouth, this marks the animal as fierce, cruel, carnivorous.
There is also a small triangle of which the point is at the outside corner of the eye; whence the line following the contour of the upper eyelid forms an angle with that coming from the nose. When the point of this angle meets toward the brow, it is a mark of mind ("esprit"), as is seen in elephants, camels, and monkeys; and if this angle falls on the nose, this marks stupidity and imbecility, as in asses and sheep..."
Here Le Brun develops the triangular geometry relating to what he apparently considered to be significant examples of animals, along with their human equivalents. Drawing on Testelin, Morel d'Arleux comments thus:
"He [Le Brun] supposed an equilateral triangle, of which the base AB, passing through the inside of the eye at E, finding itself cut off at point A, at the tip of the nose and at point B, either the tympanum of the ear or the base of the horns...
If the animal was carnivorous, he drew a parallel to the side BC of the triangle that ran through the inner corner of the eye at E, cutting more or less across the mouth at G, according to the voracity, but that would be found well inside if it were herbivorous . This same parallel extended to the brow was to strike the sign of strength, indicated by a greater elevation of this part and denoted at the same time the degree of an animal's courage.
The line HI, starting from the outer corner of the eye next to the upper lid and extending to the brow, reveals the degree of an animal's sagacity by its elevation, of mansuetude by its tending to the horizontal, of meanness or abasement by an inclination on the nose.
The outer parallel KL, drawn to the base AB of the triangle ACB and grazing the highest elevation of the brow, comes to bear on the preceding observation, leaving more or less room between it and the muzzle according to whether or not the animal is endowed with intelligence."
Bear
Boar
Camel
Cat
(via Charles Le Brun)
Cow
Crow
Donkey
(via Charles Le Brun)
Eagle
Fox
Goat
Horse
(via eBay)
Lion
Lynx
(via eBay)
Monkey
Owl
Ox
Parrot
(via Xiaoyang85)
Pig
Rabbit
Badger?
Ram
Wolf
E
___
The images are from Wellcome Library, except when noted otherwise.
No comments :
Post a Comment