When played through an optical device, Carmontelle’s 12-1/2 foot long drawing animates to tell a story of 18th-century leisure.
Figures Walking in a Parkland, France, c. 1783–1800, Louis Carrogis de Carmontelle. Watercolor and gouache with traces of black chalk underdrawing, on translucent Whatman paper, 47.3 x 377 cm. J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. Speakers: Danielle Canter, Assistant Curator, Department of Drawings, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, and Beth Harris, Executive Director, Smarthistory
What did people watch before films and digital media? This twelve-and-a-half-foot transparent drawing engages viewers in an immersive experience using optical devices. The artist designed Figures Walking in a Parkland to be enjoyed scene by scene, cranked through a device that illuminated the imagery from behind. Carmontelle incorporated light, narration, animation, and movement resulting in a magical visual experience of 18th-century leisure.
Getty has joined forces with Smarthistory to bring you an in-depth look at select works within our collection, whether you want to learn more at home or make art more accessible in your classroom. This video series illuminates art history concepts through fun, unscripted conversations between art historians, curators, archaeologists, scientists, and artists, committed to a fresh take on the history of visual arts.
“Figures Walking in a Parkland” is featured in the exhibition “Paper and Light,” part of the larger initiative “PST ART: Art & Science Collide.”
0:00:04.3 Dr. Beth Harris: We’re in the painting conservation studio at the Getty Museum, and we’re looking at a twelve-and-a-half-foot drawing with watercolor and gouache. If we were looking at it in the late 18th century, we would only be seeing a small part at a time.
0:00:19.0 Danielle Canter: The artist Carmontelle created a optical device that allowed you to experience this very long drawing scene by scene. He created a box very similar to this, where the drawing would have been placed inside rolled around two scrolls on either end. The box could then be opened at the front to allow viewers to see the drawing and another door would be opened to the back to allow daylight to stream in. This would be placed in a window with large curtains blocking out all other light, so it’s almost as if you’re in a darkened theater. And then Carmontelle, using a crank, would roll through scene by scene in order to create this animated narrative. Carmontelle was a born entertainer. He loved reflecting aristocratic society back at themselves.
0:01:16.1 Dr. Beth Harris: Carmontelle’s life corresponds with this remarkable period in French history, and he was really at the center of it.
0:01:24.8 Danielle Canter: Carmontelle worked for various courts and aristocrats in France. He is a witness to much of the social unrest that led to the revolution in France, but from within this sheltered community of the aristocratic court, and he is primarily there as an entertainer. He is a writer, he is a landscape and park designer, he is a playwright, but this is an example of his most notable invention. Carmontelle, like many other artists in this moment, was thinking about a fully immersive experience. This included magic lantern slides and other forms of optical illusion that he was interested in, but he wanted to take this a step further by not only creating an immersive experience with light and narration but also with animation, with movement, and for that reason he invented this new device called a transparency.
0:02:24.0 Dr. Beth Harris: It’s important to see him as part of this moment in the late 18th century, during this period of the Enlightenment, when there’s this emphasis on science and rational thought and yet at the same time we have this interest in this almost magical visual experience.
0:02:39.1 Danielle Canter: These new forms of optical illusion were a form of pseudoscience that was between science and entertainment. We are taken in this drawing into an incredible scene of 18th century leisure and entertainment. We are in a beautiful English-style garden in Paris, where we see groups of aristocrats and wealthy men and women gathered together in conversation, out on boats, riding on horses, and taking in the beautiful weather.
0:03:13.9 Dr. Beth Harris: There was a whole craze for English gardens and this idea of strolling through this beautiful picturesque landscape and taking in different scenes as one walked through, and that’s very much what we have here.
0:03:28.0 Danielle Canter: These English gardens in France were spaces to be seen, to perform aspects of leisure as well as enjoy it. So the scene that Carmontelle created would have started with a black sheet, almost as if you’re in a darkened movie theater, and then emerging would have been the front half of a carriage. And you can almost imagine that you are riding in this carriage and taking a trip through the beautiful garden. And as we pass from the left to the right, you start to see the scenes of leisure that would have been experienced by visitors to these well-manicured parks. And a well-loved aspect of these parks was a series of monuments and architectural follies that would have given you a sense of being outside of space and time. We see a couple leaning towards each other, and we can sort of imagine Carmontelle as he’s narrating the scene, perhaps giving us insight into the intimate conversation that they’re having or wondering what is happening in this moment behind the columns.
0:04:34.8 Dr. Beth Harris: We’re clearly following the figures in the foreground, but he creates this expansive deep space.
0:04:41.3 Danielle Canter: Absolutely. And I think that the depth of the scene would have given the viewer, who may have been sitting in a cold room in the winter, this wonderful immersive experience of being in this park space.
0:04:56.1 Dr. Beth Harris: So as we continue to move, we see two figures on horseback in between a set of trees. And then on the opposite side, this group of figures who are having this sociable moment.
0:05:07.0 Danielle Canter: Yes, I love this group with their elaborate costumes and wonderfully festooned hats with feathers. And you can see figures watching the boat riders.
0:05:18.4 Dr. Beth Harris: So we have a barking, romping dog [and] another group of figures.
0:05:23.8 Danielle Canter: This group is watching a lone violinist. You can imagine that sometimes along with his narration Carmontelle was bringing music to accompany these scenes.
0:05:33.2 Dr. Beth Harris: But there’s this element of humor, because while the violin is being played, there’s also the dog barking.
0:05:40.0 Danielle Canter: And I love the idea that as you rolled through the scene, you would have seen the dog first, imagined that sound, and then witnessed the musician. In the center of the scene, you see two children. And I sort of imagine them being taught these social norms of the aristocracy.
0:05:57.7 Dr. Beth Harris: The woman with the little boy on the right of the tree is probably his governess. And so different generations, different types of people, although all within this rarefied aristocratic world. Maybe my favorite passage is this one where the woman leans back to talk to the male figure who’s striding forward, to listen to what he’s saying.
0:06:20.0 Danielle Canter: I can imagine Carmontelle narrating the scene and perhaps surprise in the look on her face at whatever the man is saying or an intrigue into whatever he’s leaning in to say. You see this flower-lined path that winds its way back to this open pavilion that sits atop the hill.
0:06:40.3 Dr. Beth Harris: Our eye just gets to meander through this landscape.
0:06:43.7 Danielle Canter: This meandering gaze suits the idea of the English garden, where there are these curved roads that allow you to dip in and out of the trees and then happen upon beautiful sights. If we look at this couple, you can see that this sits right at the seam of one of these sheets of paper. And so I can just imagine that as Carmontelle continues to scroll through the scene, we would see once again an intimate couple sort of leaning into each other and expect that this would be sort of a hidden moment. But as you continue to scroll, you see that two other women are on the other side of the trees listening in. So I love these sorts of surprising moments that you get.
0:07:24.0 Dr. Beth Harris: And as we move on, the path divides around an obelisk.
0:07:29.7 Danielle Canter: These ideas of connecting to the ancient world and different cultures were already present in these English parks through these monuments that were scattered throughout the green spaces.
0:07:41.6 Dr. Beth Harris: And then the path winds and moves into the distance.
0:07:45.1 Danielle Canter: We can imagine that our carriage ride has come to an end, and we see a carriage riding off into the distance with two footmen posed on the back of it.
0:07:55.2 Dr. Beth Harris: It’s so sad. One really has the sense of an end to the story.
0:08:00.8 Danielle Canter: Although there’s the sadness of the end of the tale being told, what is incredible about this scene is that it could then be rolled all the way back to the beginning and started again, perhaps with a different narrative.
0:08:13.5 Dr. Beth Harris: So we’ve just looked at it illuminated from behind, the way that it would have looked. But we noticed that if you turn off the backlight, the image looks very different.
0:08:25.0 Danielle Canter: The invention of these transparent papers and Carmontelle’s understanding of how to use these opaque paints in rich colors to enhance the effect of light passing through these transparent papers is what allows the incredible effect of this scene.
0:08:43.2 Dr. Beth Harris: So imaginative, such a gifted painter, such an amazing entertainer and storyteller. What fun Carmontelle was.
