Editing Gian Lorenzo Bernini (section)

===Visit to France and service to King Louis XIV===
[[File:Château de Versailles, salon de Diane, buste de Louis XIV, Bernin (1665) 03 black bg.jpg|thumb|''Bust of Louis XIV'', 1665]]

At the end of April 1665, and still considered the most important artist in Rome, if indeed not in all of Europe, Bernini was forced by political pressure (from both the French court and Pope Alexander VII) to travel to Paris to work for King [[Louis XIV]], who required an architect to complete work on the royal palace of the [[Louvre]]. Bernini would remain in Paris until mid-October. Louis XIV assigned a member of his court to serve as Bernini's translator, tourist guide, and overall companion, [[Paul Fréart de Chantelou]], who kept a ''Journal'' of Bernini's visit that records much of Bernini's behaviour and utterances in Paris.<ref>See Cecil Gould, ''Bernini in France: An Episode in Seventeenth-Century History'', Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1982.</ref> The writer [[Charles Perrault]], who was serving at this time as an assistant to the French [[Controller-General of Finances]] [[Jean-Baptiste Colbert]], also provided a first-hand account of Bernini's visit.{{sfn|Zarucchi|2013|pp=356–70}}

Bernini was popular among the crowds who gathered wherever he stopped, which led him to compare his itinerary to the travelling exhibition of an elephant.<ref name=Poussins>{{cite journal |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/renaissance-quarterly/article/abs/poussins-elephant/884CA35266EC95189550E0754AE9BFDD |last=Rice |first=Louise |year=2017 |title=Poussin's Elephant |journal=Renaissance Quarterly |volume=70 |issue=2 |pages=548–593 |doi=10.1086/693181}} The primary source for this information is Chapter 17 of Domenico Bernini's biography of his father: see Mormando, 2011, p. 192.</ref> On his walks in Paris the streets were lined with admiring crowds too. But things soon turned sour.<ref>Cecil Gould, ''Bernini in France: An Episode in Seventeenth-century History'', Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1982. For more recent treatments of the same episode in Bernini's life, incorporating the most recent [[documentary research]] since Gould's book of 1982, see Mormando, ''Bernini: His Life and His Rome,'' 2011, chap. 5, A Roman Artist in King Louis's Court; see also Mormando's many documentary footnotes to Domenico Bernini's account of his father's dealings with the French: Domenico Bernini, ''Life of Gian Lorenzo Bernini'', notes to chapters 16–20.</ref> Bernini presented finished designs for the east front (i.e., the all-important principal facade of the entire palace) of the Louvre, which were ultimately rejected, albeit not formally until 1667, well after his departure from Paris (indeed, the already constructed foundations for Bernini's Louvre addition were inaugurated in October 1665 in an elaborate ceremony, with both Bernini and King Louis in attendance). It is often stated in the scholarship on Bernini that his Louvre designs were turned down because Louis and his finance minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert considered them too Italianate or too Baroque in style.{{sfn|Hibbard|1990|p=181}} In fact, as [[Franco Mormando]] points out, "aesthetics are ''never'' mentioned in any of [the]&nbsp;... surviving memos" by Colbert or any of the artistic advisors at the French court. The explicit reasons for the rejections were utilitarian, namely, on the level of physical security and comfort (e.g., location of the latrines).<ref>Mormando, ''Bernini: His Life and His Rome,'' pp. 255–56, emphasis added. Another issue of concern was the fact that Bernini's plan would have called for the demolition of older portions of the Louvre contrary to royal wishes.</ref> It is also indisputable that there was an interpersonal conflict between Bernini and the young French king, each one feeling insufficiently respected by the other.{{sfn|Zarucchi|2006|pp=32–38}} Though his design for the Louvre went unbuilt, it circulated widely throughout Europe by means of engravings and its direct influence can be seen in subsequent stately residences such as [[Chatsworth House]], Derbyshire, England, seat of the [[Duke of Devonshire|Dukes of Devonshire]].

Other projects in Paris suffered a similar fate, such as Bernini's plans for the Bourbon funerary chapel in the cathedral of Saint Denis and the main altar of the Church of Val de Grâce (done at the request of its patron the Queen Mother), as well as his idea for a fountain for Saint-Cloud, the estate of King Louis's brother, Philippe.<ref>Marcello Fagiolo, "Bernini a Parigi: le Colonne d'Ercole, l'Anfiteatro per il Louvre e i progetti per la Cappella Bourbon", in ''Confronto'', 10–11 (2010), pp. 104–22.</ref> With the exception of Chantelou, Bernini failed to forge significant friendships at the French court. His frequent negative comments on various aspects of French culture, especially its art and architecture, did not go down well, particularly in juxtaposition to his praise for the art and architecture of Italy (especially Rome); he said that a painting by [[Guido Reni]], the ''[[Annunciation (Reni)|Annunciation]]'' altarpiece (then in the Carmelite convent, now the Louvre Museum), was "alone worth half of Paris."{{sfn|Hibbard|1990|p=171, citing the Chantelou diary, July 16 entry}} The sole work remaining from his time in Paris is the ''[[Bust of Louis XIV (Bernini)|Bust of Louis XIV]]'' although he also contributed a great deal to the execution of the Christ Child Playing with a Nail marble relief (now in the Louvre) by his son Paolo as a gift to Queen [[Maria Theresa of Spain|Maria Theresa]]. Back in Rome, Bernini created a monumental [[Equestrian Statue of King Louis XIV (Bernini)|equestrian statue of Louis XIV]]; when it finally reached Paris (in 1685, five years after the artist's death), the French king found it extremely repugnant and wanted it destroyed; it was instead re-carved into a representation of the ancient Roman hero [[Marcus Curtius]].<ref>The most thorough study of Bernini's ''King Louis XIV Equestrian'' statue, including its ultimate fate in France, remains Rudolf Wittkower, 'The Vicissitudes of a Dynastic Monument: Bernini's Equestrian Statue of Louis XIV.' In ''De artibus Opuscula XL: Essays in Honors of Erwin Panofsky,'' ed. Millard Meiss (New York: New York University Press, 1961), pp. 497–531. For much additional, new data about the work that has surfaced since Wittkower's 1961 work, see the many notes pertinent to the statue in Franco Mormando, ''Domenico Bernini's Life of Gian Lorenzo Bernini'' (University Park, PA: Penn State University Press, 2011), pp. 396–402.</ref>