DENVER, CO.- This fall, the Denver Art Museum (DAM) will host Artisans and Kings: Selected Treasures from the Louvre, presented by Accenture, bringing masterpieces from one of the world’s most renowned museums to the western United States for the first time. Organized by the Denver Art Museum, the exhibition will feature more than 125 paintings, sculptures, and decorative arts representing works from the reigns of Louis XIV, XV, and XVI. On view October 6, 2007—January 6, 2008, Artisans & Kings is the first international exhibition to be shown in the DAM’s new Frederic C. Hamilton Building.

This exhibition marks the beginning of the Denver Art Museum featuring objects from the Louvre, including two additional shows in 2008 and 2009.

“We are thrilled to partner with the Louvre to bring these masterpieces to the West for the first time,” said DAM Director Lewis Sharp. “Our visitors will have the unprecedented opportunity to see works from the world’s greatest collection of European art. The expansion of the Denver Art Museum enables us to host an exhibition of this magnitude, and we are delighted to launch our traveling exhibition program with a show of this caliber.”

Originally the private possessions of the French monarchs, the Louvre’s royal collections were appropriated by the state during the French Revolution and became the core of the museum’s holdings in 1793. Artisans & Kings will present masterpieces from these collections, including numerous works that have never traveled to the United States. Exhibition highlights include works by such masters as Gianlorenzo Bernini, Anthony Van Dyck, Jean-Honoré Fragonard, Nicolas Poussin, Rembrandt van Rijn, Peter Paul Rubens, Titian, and Diego Velázquez.

Featuring an array of master works—painting, sculpture, tapestry, drawings, silver, porcelain, and furniture dating primarily from the 17th and 18th centuries—Artisans & Kings: Selected Treasures from the Louvre tells the intriguing stories of royal patronage during the reigns of Louis XIV, XV, and XVI.

In Denver, the exhibition has been organized by Timothy Standring, the DAM’s Gates Foundation Curator of Painting and Sculpture, and Melora McDermott-Lewis, Director of Education and Master Teacher for European and American Art, into four thematic groupings:
• Collections of kings provides a rare look into the formation of the royal collection’s masterworks of painting, drawing and sculpture. Among the highlights is Titian’s Woman with Mirror, c.1515, a quintessentially Venetian masterpiece that exemplifies the artist’s deft handling of color and light. Additional highlights include Velazquez’s The Infanta Margarita of 1653, Poussin’s Et in Arcadia Ego (The Arcadian Shepherds), c. 1638, a 17th century bronze of Pope Urban VIII by Bernini, and more than 40 drawings from the royal collection including works by Peter Paul Rubens, Albrecht Dürer, Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Breughel the Elder, and Anthony Van Dyck.
• Politics of style reveals the kings’ influential role in cultivating the production of luxury goods by promoting and investing in the porcelain, tapestry, and glass industries, which fostered the greatest period of development for French decorative arts. Highlights include a silver platter cover of exceptional detail by François-Thomas Germain, and a porcelain and bronze gilt Sèvres vase.
• Trappings of power explores the role art played in promoting the public image of the king through public sculpture, painting and decorative furnishing at Versailles. Works include an equestrian statue of Louis XIV by Thomas Gobert and a large-scale tapestry produced at the Gobelin’s factory which includes the coat of arms of France.
• Crafting a lifestyle features objects produced for the kings’ opulent public and private lives at Versailles, such as a collection of rare gold Sèvres porcelain including porcelain pots-pourris owned by Madame de Pompadour, mistress of Louis XV. Additional highlights include a nécessaire given to Louis XV’s wife on the occasion of the dauphin’s birth, and a pair of 1785 wing chairs of the finest craftsmanship, commissioned by Louis XVI’s sister, Madame Elisabeth, who never received the chairs because of the French Revolution.

Louvre at the Denver Art Museum
Following Artisans & Kings, the Denver Art Museum’s 2008 Louvre presentation will feature the work of Jean-Antoine Houdon, a major artist of the French Enlightenment whose portraiture depicted prominent intellectual and political figures of the era. In 2009, the DAM will present a third exhibition showcasing work from the Louvre’s collection; a theme to be announced in the coming year.

Henri Loyrette, director of the Louvre, explains that "a major component of the Louvre’s strategy is to fulfill our universal vocation as completely as we can, while at the same time renewing it. It seems especially natural for us to turn to the United States, with whom we have very special, longstanding ties. In this respect, the exhibitions at the Denver Art Museum will contribute to bolstering our ties with the United States."

Programming and Education: As part of the DAM’s innovative educational initiatives, the Artisans & Kings exhibition will feature working metalsmiths, porcelain painters, and weavers in a stage-like demonstration area. These tradesmen will reveal the creative processes used centuries ago in the design and manufacture of objects on view. The exhibition will also feature instructional photographs, period drawings, hands-on materials, and step-by-step illustrations in “craftsmanship bars”—in-depth focus areas that explore the artisans and artistry behind the royal collections.

This exhibition is accompanied by a 163-page, full-color catalogue entitled Artisans & Kings: Selected Treasures from the Louvre. Published by the Denver Art Museum and the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, the catalogue features a collection of scholarly essays by museum curators and additional contributors.

Artisans & Kings: Selected Treasures from the Louvre is presented in association with Louvre Atlanta, a collaboration between the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, and Musée du Louvre, Paris. This exhibition is presented by Accenture and generously supported by AXA Art. Additional funding is provided by The Adolph Coors Foundation Exhibition Fund, Atlantic Trust, Avanade Inc., U.S. Bank, and the citizens who support the Scientific and Cultural Facilities District. Promotional support is provided by Comcast, The Denver Post, The Integer Group, and 5280 Magazine.

Presenting Partner, Accenture, a global management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company, is collaborating with the DAM to provide consulting expertise across a number of key areas designed to enhance the experience for museum attendees and annual members.