Au Père Tranquille and Louis XVI : trompe l’œil or coincidence ?

Have you ever noticed…
that the sign for Paris restaurant Au Père Tranquille bears a striking resemblance to the profile of Louis XVI? … except that Louis is rarely represented with a smile.
Is this a mere coincidence, or another case of the hidden profile trompe l’œil we have seen elsewhere?
Au Père Tranquille is a veritable institution in the neighborhood of Les Halles. The brasserie has occupied this spot (16 rue Pierre Lescot, 1er) since the end of the 19th century, when a strong conservative backlash brought Catholicism and tradition back into style. (Perhaps the smile is his revenge on those republicans who had suppressed the Catholic, royalist past for such a long time?) This restaurant has seen many changes nearby, from the old market Les Halles de Paris, and the present Forum des Halles and, it appears, the Nouveau Forum des Halles to be constructed next year, despite the citizens’ complaints and demonstrations (see our article of May 2010, “Can activism save the trees of Les Halles?”)
What other restaurants–in Paris or elsewhere in France–bear signs hearkening back to revolutionary history? Stand by for more postings to come…

Trompe l’œil imagery: Irma, ou les malheurs d’une jeune orpheline

Thanks to the astute detective work of participants in the October 2009 “Teachers as Scholars” seminar on the French Revolution, another tantalizing instance of trompe l’œil imagery has been unveiled. Look carefully at the folds of Irma’s dress, near her right leg, and you will see an angry head jutting forward toward the tomb.
Given that the story ends with a macabre account of Robespierre’s ghost haunting the catacombs in Paris and devouring the remains of his victims, perhaps this furious demonic-looking face is supposed to represent the infamous terrorist himself. It would make sense, as this image captures the final scene of the first edition of Irma, where Irma (anagram of Marie, sole survivor of the royal family) is reunited with her betrothed, the Duc d’Angoulême, and takes a vow to marry him over the tomb of Louis XVI.

This frontispiece is found in Elisabeth Guénard (Méré, madame Brossin de). Irma, ou les malheurs d’une jeune orpheline ; histoire indienne, avec des romances. Publié par la Ce. Gd. A Delhy et se trouve à Paris : Chez l’auteur, An VIII (1799-1800). University of Notre Dame: Rare Books Small PQ 1987.G45.I7.1799z. vol. 1.

Trompe-l’œil: a metaphysics of observing

After visiting the exhibit, “Une image peut en cacher une autre” at the Grand Palais yesterday, I realized that the the popularity of “The Mysterious Urn” (posted on 5/13/09) relied not only on political sympathies, but also on a way of seeing.  This imagery rewards the observer who looks beyond the obvious for vestiges or hints of other realities.  Like the exhibit artworks, the trompe-l’œil invites and in fact trains the eye to reverse black/white and scrutinize the contours, the blank spaces, the silences, for what might lie behind them.  The “Mysterious Urn” points to a metaphysics of observing, as well as a politics of mourning.  Note how the sunrays backlighting the “Mysterious Urn” illuminate the otherwise static seated figure and cast an expectant air on the scene, as if the Almighty were effecting some kind of miracle before our eyes.  Hopes for the king’s eventual martyrdom relied on a leap of faith (or credulous imagination) similar to those hopes that buoyed the heartbroken people who attended popular fantasmagoria shows after the Terror, and paid to bring loved ones back to life, if only for a moment, in a flimsy flickering image on a poorly-lit wall…

The fantasmagoria show pictured here is from Etienne-Gaspard Robertson, Mémoires récréatifs, scientifiques et anecdotiques d’un physicien-aéronaute, tome 1 : « La Fantasmagorie ». Éditeur : Cafe Clima (2000), where you will find many accounts of such events, and their effects on the spellbound audiences.  For an eloquent analysis of our attraction to this kind of image/spectacle, see Max Milner, La Fantasmagorie : essai sur l’optique fantastique, Paris, PUF, 1982.  A good, short account of this phenomenon is in Marie Lechner, ”Les médias disparus,” Libération.fr (August 2008).

Memory, spectacle, wishing, and grief… in a society wracked by trauma these words and feelings  interpenetrate and saturate the imaginary.  The codified genre of mysterious urns and weeping willows  functions like the literary genre of  “élégide”: ”C’est un récit poétique, nécessairement plaintif et possiblement merveilleux, d’une passion, c’est-à-dire d’une souffrance.” [a poetic account, necessarily plaintive and possibly marvelous, of a passion, that is, of suffering.  --J.J Regnault-Warin, L'Ange des prisons (1817).]

What other kinds of codified, trompe-l’œil, layered memorials existed in the post-revolutionary period?

The Mysterious Urn: what does it mean?

What is the urn’s mystery: Cautious hope of a Bourbon resurrection and melodrama over the thwarted tomb? Or an attempt at reconciliation by republicans tormented by past brutality and seeking expiation in the realm of the imagination?

(Hint:  Look in the tree’s branches, and at the sides of the urn, to see the hidden profiles of Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette, Mme Elisabeth, and the two royal children.)

Some guidance to this imagery may be found in Richard Taws, “Trompe l’oeil and Trauma: Money and Memory after the Terror,” Oxford Art Journal 30, 3 (2007): 355-76.