Artwork Title: Eavesdropping, or Behind Closed Doors

Eavesdropping, or Behind Closed Doors

Charles Baugniet

Baugniet's paintings are a perfect late 19th-century example of the sort of very pretty genre pieces that were popular for - literally - centuries. Attractive upper middle class people, predominantly female, acting out the petty joys and dramas of their patently artificial lives. Always fashionably dressed, always ensconced in the most fashionable interiors. Usually rather insipid, at best, and quite often toothache-inducingly sugary and vulgar, or even mildly salacious. Baugniet's are quite a bit better than most. The situations are just as false and coy, but his characterizations are more naturalistic and sober. He displays restraint and taste in color and detail. His draftsmanship, use of light, and descriptive abilities are rock-solid. And his handling of drapery is superb. All of these paintings have obvious and rather pointless titles, and all are from the very end of the 1860s into the 1870s. (http://godsandfoolishgrandeur.blogspot.nl/2017/04/decorative-white-women-genre-paintings.html)
Uploaded on Jul 21, 2017 by Suzan Hamer

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