Salon (Paris): Difference between revisions

== Origins ==

In 1667, the royally sanctioned French institution of art patronage, the [[Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture]]<ref name=Britannica /> (a division of the [[Académie des beaux-arts]]), held its first semi-public art exhibit at the Salon Carré. The Salon's original focus was the display of the work of recent graduates of the [[École des Beaux-Arts]], which was created by [[Cardinal Mazarin]], chief minister of France, in 1648. Exhibition at the Salon de Paris was essential for any artist to achieve success in France for at least the next 200 years. Exhibition in the Salon marked a sign of royal favor.

In 1725, the Salon was held in the [[Louvre_Palace|Palace of the Louvre]], when it became known as ''Salon'' or ''Salon de Paris''. In 1737, the exhibitions, held from 18 August 1737 to 5 September 1737 at the Grand Salon of the [[Louvre]],<ref>“Public Access to Art in Paris: A Documentary History from the Middle Ages to 1800,” by Robert W. Berger, p. 171.</ref> became public. They were held, at first, annually, and then biennially, in odd-numbered years. They would start on the feast day of [[Louis IX of France|St. Louis]] (25 August) and run for some weeks. Once made regular and public, the Salon's status was "never seriously in doubt" (Crow, 1987). In 1748 a [[jury]] of awarded artists was introduced. From this time forward, the influence of the Salon was undisputed.

 

 

=== Early splinter groups ===

The increasingly conservative and [[Academic art|academic]] juries were not receptive to the [[Impressionism|Impressionist]] painters,<ref name=Impressionists>{{cite web|title=The End of the Salon and the Rise of Impressionism|url=http://www.radford.edu/rbarris/art216upd2012/Impressionism.html|website=radford.edu|accessdate=14 June 2015}}</ref> whose works were usually rejected, or poorly placed if accepted. The Salon opposed the Impressionists' shift away from traditional painting styles. In 1857<ref>The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade that Gave the World Impressionism, page 59, by Ross King</ref> the Salon jury turned away an unusually high number of the submitted paintings. An uproar resulted, particularly from regular exhibitors who had been rejected. In order to prove that the Salons were democratic, [[Napoleon III]] instituted the [[Salon des Refusés]], containing a selection of the works that the Salon had rejected that year. It opened on 17 May 1863, marking the birth of the [[avant-garde]]. The [[Impressionists]] held their own independent exhibitions in 1874, 1876, 1877, 1879, 1880, 1881, 1882 and 1886.