French interiors of the C18th: what do they tell us about their lifestyles?
Schedule
Sat Oct 25 2025 at 11:00 am to 12:00 pm
UTC+11:00Location
Allport Library and Museum of Fine Arts | Hobart, TS
About this Event
“In my view you must either do away with ornament or make ornament the essence. It’s not something you add. It’s not icing on a cake. It’s everything – or it’s nothing.”
Jean-Antoine Watteau
About
French interior decoration and the decorative arts of the eighteenth century are widely regarded as reaching an extraordinary level of quality and refinement.
Drawing mostly from contemporary paintings and drawings of interiors, this talk will take us into the living rooms, the dining rooms and the boudoirs of eighteenth century Paris and explore how interiors were decorated, furnished, and inhabited by the Parisian elite, and how they lived.
Allport collection
From the 1930s to the 1960s, Henry Allport and his wife Daisy added to Daisy’s family collection of export Chinese and early English ware. Today, her collection is only one of three collections of this type in Australia. The collection is also home to a number of examples of fine French decorative arts, including the Sèvres vase pictured. The French vases, clocks and other eighteenth century items will be on display during the talk.
John Whitehead
John Whitehead is a UK based art historian, dealer, writer and lecturer specialising in French eighteenth and nineteenth century interior decoration and works of art, with an emphasis on Sèvres porcelain.
Image credits
De Troy Garter, 1724
The Garter is an oil on canvas painting by French painter Jean-François de Troy, from 1724. It is held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York.
Blarenberghe Choiseul Box 1770
The celebrated "Choiseul Snuffbox" was created by the goldsmith Louis Roucel and miniaturist Louis-Nicolas Van Blarenberghe, circa 1770-71. Within its tiny gold framework, the gouache miniatures are set beneath crystal glazing and depict, all save one, interiors of the Hôtel de Choiseul, the duc de Choiseul's Parisian hôtel particulier on the Rue de Richelieu
Sevres Vase, Allport Library and Museum of Fine Arts collection, State Library and Archives of Tasmania
John Whitehead at the Elysee Palace.
This event is presented in conjunction with the Friends of the Allport.
Where is it happening?
Allport Library and Museum of Fine Arts, 91 Murray Street, Hobart, AustraliaEvent Location & Nearby Stays:
AUD 0.00
