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Part of the book: The Appearance of Character

Melissa Percival

MHRA Texts and Dissertations 47

W. S. Maney & Son Ltd for the Modern Humanities Research Association

EnlightenmentFrenchPhilosophyopen

Abstract.  Charles Le Brun's Conférence sur l'expression générale et particulière is one of the most comprehensive and influential analyses of facial expression in painting: through both text and image, it synthesises a contemporary Cartesian physiology of the passions and pre-existing expressive traditions in painting and rhetoric. The lecture, which was first delivered to the Paris Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture in 1668, had a resonance in art theory and practice for over two centuries, and the text and its accompanying illustrations were widely reproduced, both as a whole and in parts. As well as being of use to practising artists, Le Brun's work reached a non-specialist audience through its incorporation into the Encyclopédie entry 'Dessin'.

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