GIOVANNI BATTISTA GAULLI, known as BACICCIO

Portrait of Emmanuel Theodose de La Tour d’Auvergne, Cardinal de Bouillon (1670)

Oil on canvas (121 x 97 cm)

Chateau de Versailles

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Dramatized by the crimson velvet drapery, this sumptuous composition showing a young prelate rising from a chair superbly decorated with his coat of arms perfectly matches the sitter’s well-known fondness for pomp and splendour. Emmanuel Theodose de La Tour d’Auvergne (1643-1715), a confirmed bibliophile and collector, often posed for the artists Nicolas and Pierre Mignard, Claude Mellan and Hyacinthe Rigaud. Turenne’s nephew, he became a cardinal in August 1669, at the age of twenty-six; something that illustrates the tremendous influence and power of the French nobility within the higher echelons of the French Catholic Church.

The painting presents a dichotomy between the composition and the painterly technique. The former is awkward,  the cardinal seems to rise from his armchair to face the viewer but he looks sideways to his right as if distracted by the arrival of an unexpected visitor. On the other hand, the painting technique is superb, the creamy look of the chasuble contrasts with the shimmering red silk cape, while the exquisitely embroidered lace is rendered with consummate skill and flair.

The fleeting nature of Cardinal de Bouillon’s gesture enlivens what was ordinarily too static a layout and helps us to understand what Lione Pascoli, the painter’s biographer, meant when he explained in his 1730 Vite de Pittori, Scultori, ed Architetti Moderni how, unlike other portraitists Gaulli had adopted Bernini’s habit of showing his sitters in motion.