The Artist as “Rénovateur”: Paul Baudry and the Paris Opéra

Abstract

I should like to consider here the paintings of Paul Baudry for the foyer of the Paris Opera in light of the conservative reaction to the events of 1870-71—the Franco-Prussian War and the Paris Commune. Exhibited in the Ecole des Beaux-Arts from August to October 1874, and installed in the Opera itself from early 1875 (Fig. 1), Baudry's decorative cycle may be read, I believe as an unconscious indication of an ideologically defined position.