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Concept
Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture
Summary
The Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture (akademi ʁwajal də pɛ̃tyʁ e də skyltyʁ; "Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture") was founded in 1648 in Paris, France. It was the premier art institution of France during the latter part of the Ancien Régime until it was abolished in 1793 during the French Revolution. It included most of the important painters and sculptors, maintained almost total control of teaching and exhibitions, and afforded its members preference in royal commissions.
In the 1640s, France's artistic life was still based on the medieval system of guilds like the Académie de Saint-Luc which had a tight grip on the professional lives of artists and artisans alike. Some artists had managed to get exemptions but these were based on favoritism rather than merit.
A few "superior men" who were "real artists", suffered and felt humiliated under this system.
In view of increasing pressure by the Parisian guilds for painters and sculptors to submit to their control, the young but already very successful painter Charles Le Brun conceived a plan to free the true artists from the humiliating influence of mere artisans. He involved his two close friends, the brothers Louis and Henri Testelin, to lobby for an independent organisation where membership was based on merit alone, following the examples of the Accademia delle Arti del Disegno in Florence and the Accademia di San Luca in Rome.
Soon, the courtier Martin de Charmois and several more artists became involved and drafted a petition for the foundation of the Académie. Charmois assembled as many artists with royal patronage as he could to sign it, which a great number did. With the support of Le Brun's patron Pierre Séguier, Chancellor of France, Charmois presented the petition to the nine-year-old King Louis XIV, his mother Anne of Austria who acted as regent and the whole Royal Council on 20 January 1648 at the Palais-Royal. All present approved and the foundation of the Académie Royale was granted.
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