Well, I'm back from my little sabbatical, but I don't think cramming for my Year 12 exams - since July! - was any kind of break. Anywho, published hereunder - I always wanted to use that word - is my second piece in this year's edition of the Emmanuel College Literary Journal, a small pr
ècis of whom a friend of mine considers to be the "Fonz of the Eighteenth Century" and general meme superstar, Joseph Ducruex.
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After consulting with my Design Editor, Troy Torcasio, about
the front cover that should be used for the second edition of the Literary Journal , I suggested a reference
to current Internetz culture, viz. the Joseph Ducreux meme. (Okay, there was no
suggestion at all; it was actually me exercising arbitrary power in a sign of
my becoming mad with power, or the low-fat sugar-free version that comes in the
position I hold). Before anyone invokes Rule 1, I offer the following: we must
subscribe to the doctrine of Wikipedia, where all human knowledge is available
for all. Anywho, the point is that Mr. Torcasio, upon seeing the infamous
self-portrait (“Portrait of an artist in the guise of a joker”, left), described him
as being “the Fonz of the eighteenth century”. At first I thought it was an
interpretation based in the plane of imagination, but as I will prove –
eventually – it may be that this is a concept grounded a little more in
reality.
Born in Nancy, to the northeast of Paris, on June 26, 1735,
Ducreux trained with his father – also a painter – before moving to the City of
Light in 1760. There, he studied portraiture under the tutelage of
Maurice-Quentin de la Tour.
His first big assignment came in 1769 when he was sent to
Vienna to paint the wife of the future king, or dauphin, for his appraisal and approval. As those who have studied
the French Revolution will know, the marriage of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette
caused consternation and even outright anger in the years before the taking of
the Bastille and the eventual establishment of the republic. I am not for one
unit of time insinuating that Ducreux has some hitherto-unseen blame to take
for the loss of a 200-year monarchy, but one wonders of course, if one were to
be endowed with Doctor Who-like time travelling powers, (actually, I’ll think
I’ll go with Doc “Great Scott” Brown and his wacko DeLorean) what the
consequences would be of preventing Ducreux’s passage to Vienna. The response
would surely involve the impossibility of one’s current existence, due to one’s
accidental murdering of some obscure relative of one...but, as with most things
with me, that’s kindling for another fire.
In any case, Ducreux was made premier peintre de la reine (“first painter to the Queen”, for all
you Francophobes) for his work, and also became a baron.
As the first heads were being lopped off at the outbreak of
the French Revolution, Ducreux travelled to London to produce the last portrait
of Louis XVI, left – a gloomy monarch shows little emotion as he is captured in a
stiff, collared shirt, far removed from his days of opulence during the ançien
regime.
Upon returning to Paris in 1793, Ducreux stayed at the
residence of Jacques-Louis David, the de
facto painter of the revolution. He died in 1802, on the road between Paris
and Saint-Denis, a small northern suburb.
SIGNIFICANCE
Ducreux’s more memorable works call to mind the tronies, or
portraits produced during the Dutch Golden Age (the 17th century) focussing
on the face. These illustrations were the caricatures of the day, emphasising
distorted facial features in place of reality. Adriaen Brouwer’s “The Bitter
Tonic”, right, is emblematic of this genre – the image depicts a plebeian regretting,
with a distaste that is almost audible, his choice of refreshment. Similar to
his contemporary Rembrandt, Brouwer sought to challenge the limitations of a
two-dimensional representation. In Ducreux reviving what was essentially a
disestablishmentarian spirit, he rejected the notions of hierarchy pervading
the French Academy of Painting and Sculpture – even though he was a commoner he
was able to flourish under the patronage of Marie-Antoinette.
So what is the point of Ducreux’s renaissance on the
Internet? I was not around when some random started the meme – “ye olde”
English imposed on modern pop culture references (the idea of an ancient
Frenchman “speaking” outdated English to comment on current culture is actually
quite surreal). But if I were to posit an opinion – and this is presupposing a
knowledge of Ducreux’s context – it would be that Ducreux’s rebellionism is an
outlet for the anonymous to vent their spleen about the jarring and obfuscating
nature of current English use, a crime of which I am guilty as much as Kevin
Rudd and any communicator of his ilk. By continuing this meme, people are able
to tangibly subvert what has become of leitmotif of our political life: the
intersection between the politicians that speak and write the
almost-meaningless words, the media that report and compartmentalise them and
the consumer that digests them – in both the original and reported forms. This
subversion takes place because of the frustration that takes place when
witnessing this never-ending cycle of political discourse. In a word (yeah, right),
Ducreux’s rebirth could be just as important as the Occupy movement that is
currently occurring worldwide.
Raised from the dead to be feted throughout the hallowed
pages of the Internet, Joseph Ducreux and his wonderful self-portrait have become,
for me at least, an icon for freedom and individualistic joie de vivre. Upon further consideration, it may be that Ducreux’s
oeuvre is illustrative of
rebellionism, a trait shared by everybody’s favourite 1950s sitcom character
(or at least my Design Editor’s) – the Fonz.
