THE STYLE OF LOUIS XIV. 



291 



the importance of the cartouche motive to a minimum. Vouet's 

 arabesques (Fig. 278), while based on those of Raphael, are less open 

 in design, and consist of more massive elements. Nicolas Poussin 

 (1594-1665), who spent most of his life in Rome and was of all his 

 contemporaries most penetrated with the ideals of antiquity, was invited 

 to Paris to take part in the 

 decoration of the Louvre 

 (1640-2), and composed a 

 severely classical scheme for 

 the long gallery, incorporating 

 casts of ancient reliefs. He 

 did not, however, hit it off 

 with Le Mercier; Vouet in- 

 trigued against him ; and he 

 returned to Rome. The 

 naturalised Fleming, Philippe 

 de Champaigne (1602-74), 

 who was much influenced by 

 Poussin, worked in Riche- 

 lieu's palaces and many of 

 the Paris churches, and 

 Charles Errard (1601-89), 

 who had studied in Rome, 

 painted a gallery at the 

 chateau of Dangu (1645) f r 

 M. des Noyers, and later 

 worked at the Louvre and 

 Tuileries and in the Palais 

 des Etats at Rennes. 



All these men were, more 

 or less, directly imbued with 

 classical traditions of a fairly 

 severe character. Even 

 when, as in the case of 

 Charles Le Brun, who was 

 influenced by Pietro da Cor- 

 tona and Bernini, there was 

 an admixture of barocco ten- 

 dencies, these never completely predominated. Le Brun's enormous out- 

 put was in part carried out by a numerous staff of assistants of various 

 nationalities. Mazarin often employed Italians, including the painter 

 Francesco Romanelli (1610-62), and the stucco worker Pietro Sasso, who 

 decorated the new galleries in his palace, and also Anne of Austria's 

 new apartment in the Petite Galerie of the Louvre (1554-6). 



ARABESQUE BY S. VOUET. 

 FROM DORIGNY. 



