This exhibition draws on a world that does not exist in Australia. If you walk through large public buildings in Australia you mainly see understated and sleek. The French Louis era was the opposite – over the top bling encrusted grand scale in everything.
The National Gallery has some disadvantages as an art space but when you bring in grand scale works it comes into its own. There are tapestries that seem to be the size of the house I live in right now. There are rooms in the display that are almost the scale of the palace at Versailles itself.
The choice of objects to come to Australia are varied – ranging from a large fountain and grand scale paintings and tapestries to statues and furniture and crockery. As you would expect there is nothing in the space that is not gorgeously and elaborately designed and decorated. A thing I love about this exhibition is the context of housing these objects inthe NGA which is unfinished concrete and glass brutalism.
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Some pics below: