Chardin’s House of Cards

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Rosa Somerville finds great art on show at Waddesdon Manor, Buckinghamshire

A visit to Waddesdon Manor before 15 July will certainly require time as there is so much to see. Not only this exhibition of a small but select group of Chardin paintings and related material,  but also a group of vitrines installed around the house by the potter, Edmund de Waal. There is a exhibition of 18th-century French board games and, in the grounds,  Christies have installed a group of  recent sculptures made ‘in response to Chardin’s House of Cards’.  I saw a giant teapot entitled Miss Jasmine by Joana Vasconcelos which awaited its ‘filling’ of jasmine plants. (This continues to 28 October – Joana Vasconcelos had a major show at the palace of Versailles in June http://www.cassone-art.com/art-news/2012/06/joana-vasconcelos-at-versailles/).

 The main exhibition is centred on a version of Boy Building a House of Cards (once at Nuneham Courtenay) which now belongs to a Rothschild Family Trust. It is a measure of the drawing power of the Rothschild name that this exhibition is so ample.  The scholarly and substantial catalogue by the curator, Juliet Carey – whose ‘vision and style’ are commended by Lord Rothschild – is a proper and detailed record of the creation and provenance of the four variations of a boy building a house of cards painted by Jean-Siméon Chardin (1699–1779) in the mid to late 1730s.  They have been lent by the National Gallery, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, and the Louvre to be shown alongside the Rothschild Trust version.  

In  addition to these, other loans help to examine the tantalizing element of repetition of subjects in the artist’s work.  Two versions of The Cellar Boy andThe Scullery Maid are on display, although the lighting in the exhibition room makes detailed study of the differences difficult to detect (here the catalogue comes in handy). This is a rare opportunity to see all four, as only the Hunterian  Museum and Art Gallery in Glasgow own both subjects. They surround a much larger Hunterian Chardin,  The Lady Taking Tea, seen at The Wallace Collection in 2008 during the exhibition ‘Boucher & Chardin: Masters of Modern Manners’.

 A special treat is the Girl with a Shuttlecock  (Private Collection), which was first exhibited at the Paris Salon alongside what is now the National Gallery of Washington House of Cards – although here in the same room they are not hung alongside each other.  A group of prints and even a rather wonderful opening in a Livre de caricatures tant bonnes que mauvaises by Charles-Germain de Saint-Aubin (which belongs to Waddesdon) showing Madame de Pompadour and the Count Stahremberg ‘negotiating’ the Franco-Austrian Alliance of 1756!  The magnificent Sèvres Stahremberg service can be seen along the corridor – just one example of the extensive links within the collection.

The catalogue essays discuss the themes of childhood, play, card games and ‘taking time’, in the 18th century and the collecting of Charlotte de Rothschild (1825–99).  The appendices drawn from Rothschild archives list the substantial collection of Chardin paintings, which was inherited by her son Henri. Ironically, he sent the bulk of the collection to England for safety during the Second World War,  only for most of them to be destroyed in 1942 in an air raid over Bath.   Technical notes on some of the paintings conclude the appendices.

A small but helpful booklet is available for visitors, which gives a good introduction to the exhibition. The same information can also be found on Taking Time, a free app for ‘smartphones’,  which includes information on ‘Playing, Learning, Flirting’ (the exhibition of board games mentioned above.)

Monumentality, geometry, repetition and stillness are part of the work of both Chardin and  Edmund de Waal, which make a satisfying  conjunction of contrast and comparison.  De Waal’s playful but thoughtful installations throughout the main rooms of the house and in Windmill  Hill  are deliberately unobtrusive but a delight to discover. A small booklet is also available for this (but sadly no app).  This exhibition continues to 28 October.

There is also an extensive programme of events and study days throughout the season to tempt visitors to go and enjoy the ‘theatrical splendour’ of this wonderful treasure house where art stretches across the centuries.

Taking Time: Chardin’s Boy Building a House of Cards and Other Paintings by Juliet Carey with essays by  Pierre Rosenberg and Katie Scott is published by Paul Holberton Publishing, 2012. 160 pp., 69 colour/53 black and white, £30.00. ISBN 978 1 907372 339