Jean-Joseph-Xavier Bidauld

Bio

Although lauded by his contemporaries Bidauld’s reputation has been overshadowed by that of Valenciennes, and by the disfavor that his neo-classical landscape style fell into with the onset of the realist movement. The son of a provincial goldsmith, he received his earliest artistic instruction from his elder brother, Jean-Pierre-Xavier Bidauld (1745-1813), an undistinguished painter of landscapes and still lifes. Displaying some early talent he was admitted to the Lyon école des Beaux-Arts, studying with a friend of his brother, J.-J. Boissieu (1736-1810), spending six years in this city (interrupted by a trip to Geneva where he was exposed to the work of the Dutch 17th century painters in private collections there). In 1783 he arrived in Paris and was soon employed by the picture dealer and perfume seller Dulac who financed his trip to Italy in 1785.

The Italian trip was the defining experience of his career and the paintings he produced there, many begun en plein air and painted in oil on paper, proved the sources and inspiration for much of his later work. Indeed he retained many of these Italian sketches throughout his career, returning again and again to the same sources and themes. Bidauld’s work at this time is notable for its clarity, the tips of the foreground trees being touched with a warm golden light set against a cool blue sky; the more distant views often laid out across the various planes as if painted from a higher point than the landscape beyond. From 1791, when he first showed at the Salon, he sometimes set historical scenes in his more ambitious landscapes, such as the Oedipus untied from a tree by a shepherd (Compiégne, Musée National du Château) shown in 1793. It was in this latter year that Bidauld showed what is probably his most ambitious work, the View of the Island of Sora in the Kingdom of Naples (Paris, Louvre), which he produced after obtaining a prix d’encouragement of 2000 livres. Bidauld was now firmly established and his reputation such that in 1800 he was commissioned by Charles IV of Spain to produce a set of four views (the Seasons) for the latter’s Casita del Labrador at the Royal Palace of Aranjuez, where they hang today.

With the advent of the Empire Bidauld found himself in the enviable position of being the favorite landscape painter of Napoleon and his family. The Emperor’s brother Joseph, King of Naples (later King of Spain), commissioned him to paint six views of his Parc de Mortefontaine, and his sister, Caroline, Grand Duchess of Berg and Cleves (later Queen of Naples), ordered four large works for the Elysées Palace. He produced several other large-scale series, these carefully constructed works following the conventions of the ideal landscape established by Claude and reinvented by Valenciennes, but with a light and precision that was the peculiar characteristic of Bidauld. He continued painting his finished works in this highly decorative style under the Restoration, producing two substantial works for the redecorations of the Salle de Diane at Fontainebleau that were shown at the 1822 Salon and several paintings for the Duchess of Berry. Bidauld, however, proved immune to the impact of Constable that so affected the younger generation and by the 1830s his painting style seemed rétardataire. Nonetheless he continued to exhibit at the Salons, showing for the last time in 1841, while a small work dated 1846 demonstrates that he continued his art until his death at the age of eighty-eight. Corot is reported to have said of him “he wasn’t just anybody, he was at times truly a master, and one of the finest. Certain of his small canvases are masterpieces, and full of fine example and sound counsel for all of us, young and old alike. I admire him and I respect him, since, you see, I owe him a great deal, if not my very best.”[1]