French Sculptors and Painters at the Royal Palace in Stockholm 1693–1713 : Roles, contexts and practices

The thesis deals with French sculptors and painters active around 1700 at the Royal Palace in Stockholm. They were summoned from Paris by the architect Nicodemus Tessin the younger (1654–1728). This study analyses the Frenchmen’s professional roles, how Tessin organised their work and the working methods applied in the decoration of the Gallery of Charles XI and the adjoining parade rooms. It also involves questions concerning the artist’s roles and the status of artistic professions at the early modern period. The artisans were a group of some fifteen sculptors, painters, founders and a goldsmith. Several of them were accompanied by family members, some of whom were active in the workshop. In France these sculptors and painters had worked in the Bâtiments du Roi and particularly at the Gobelins. Although they were not part of the artistic elite at the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture they had vital knowledge in classical pattern/design, le bon goût and drawing. The artisans were also members of the guild system and were thus permitted to accept private commissions. My aim has been to clarify the artisans’ background in Paris and the recruitment undertaken by the diplomat Daniel Cronström (1655–1719). With regard to their activities in Sweden, it has been important to clarify their conditions in the building organisation at the Royal Palace, including social contexts such as their family situation and the possibility to practise their Catholic faith. Equally important is the professional relationship between the Frenchmen and Tessin, who was appointed Superintendent in 1697. Through detailed archival studies, the working practices and the creative process are analysed, especially the collaboration between Tessin and the painter Jacques Foucquet and the sculptors René Chauveau (1663–1722) and Jacques Foucquet (1639–1731)