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| Jean Fouquet Construction of the Temple of Jerusalem ca. 1470-75 tempera on vellum Bibliothèque nationale de France |
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| Jean Fouquet Construction of the Temple of Jerusalem (cropped) ca. 1470-75 tempera on vellum Bibliothèque nationale de France |
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| Jean Fouquet Construction of the Temple of Jerusalem (workers above) ca. 1470-75 tempera on vellum Bibliothèque nationale de France |
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| Jean Fouquet Construction of the Temple of Jerusalem (workers below) ca. 1470-75 tempera on vellum Bibliothèque nationale de France |
Architecture Inside a Book
We know of many panel paintings by Jean Fouquet, but it is as a book artist that his reputation is matchless. Among the numerous works he illustrated, perhaps the most memorable is The Jewish Antiquities by Flavius Josephus, a Jewish writer of the first century after Christ, retelling in twenty books the history of the Jewish people since their beginnings. In the 15th century scholars became interested in documenting Jewish origins as related to the Bible. This curiosity led somewhat later to the study of Greek texts, to the igniting of the Reformation, and to historical inquiries that ended by eroding the authority of Holy Writ.
Book illustration allowed Fouquet to explore the art of landscapes and cityscapes. He challenged himself to represent architecture using a variety of approaches and viewpoints, taking a particular interest in the building-up process, as here, and in the tearing-down process, as in the fall of Jericho or the demolition of this same temple of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar.
Construction Site
The temple does not share the same floorplan as a cathedral. The sanctuary, housing the Arc of the Covenant, is described as a cube in the first Book of Kings – "twenty cubits in length, and twenty cubits in breadth, and twenty cubits in the height thereof" – yet it is evidently being constructed in the same manner as cathedrals in Fouquet's century. The Biblical account also is the source that specifies an overall treatment of exterior gilding. At the moment we are given to observe, this process has not been completed: the gold layer has not yet reached the roofline.
The construction site remains active around this nearly-finished cathedral. Groups of workmen bustle about. We see stonemasons busy with their tools. Visible on top of the building is the crane hoisting up blocks to support the dome, the crowning ornament of the structure, which other images show as complete. This is the temple within which were installed the famous, spiraling Solomonic columns which Bernini attempted to reproduce in Rome for the baldacchino inside St. Peter's.
The Palace of the Poor
King Solomon, positioned within a loggia of his palace, surveys the course of his newest enterprise. Power gazes at its reflection, since a project of this type implies wealth, stability, strength. Courtiers ascend a stairway, arriving at the palace to observe for themselves the good progress being made across the way, while the faithful enter the temple itself carrying holy candles and offerings.
The rising edifice with its surroundings represents the society from which it springs, but it also represents the building of the book, as it is transcribed and painted. Fouquet proposes a new reading of the text of Flavius Josephus, but also of the Bible, taken together as a whole, for which he is inventing new images, concentrating in the small spaces of his pages the immense scope and variety of nature and the creative intensity of laboring humanity.
– translated and adapted from Le Musée imaginaire de Michel Butor: 105 œuvres décisives de la peinture occidentale (Paris: Flammarion, 2019)