Orientalism | Jean Baptiste Massard (1740-1822)

Mavi Boncuk |The Public Dancers, from Volume II Costumes and Portraits of 'Description of Egypt', engraved by Jean Baptiste Massard, pub. under the orders of Napoleon, 1822

(b Bell?me, Orne, 22 Aug 1740; d Paris, 16 March 1822). French printmaker. He studied engraving under Fran?ois-Nicolas Martinet and Jean-Georges Wille, establishing his reputation as an engraver of book illustrations by contributing 16 plates to the edition by Pierre-Fran?ois Basan and No?l Le Mire of Ovid's Metamorphoses (1767-71). However, it is in his engravings after Jean-Baptiste Greuze that the velvet-like texture of his work can be seen to best advantage, notably in La M?re bien aim?e (1775; London, BM, Portalis 6) and La Dame bienfaisante (1778; London, BM, Portalis 4). Massard's plates have always been criticized for being overworked, but an anonymous writer of 1779, thought to be the engraver Charles-Etienne Gaucher, blamed this partly on Greuze, who overemphasized the importance of tone in line-engraving and took such an interest in the engraving of his own works that he would often add the finishing touches himself. It seems that Greuze did in fact retouch Massard's plates. Massard also engraved genre scenes after Pierre-Antoine Baudouin, includingLe Lever (1771; London, BM, Portalis 1), one of his best plates. As well as continuing to engrave for some of the most luxurious editions of the period, Massard collaborated on several of the publications on museum collections, such as Jean-Baptiste Wicar's Galerie de Florence (1789-1807) and S.-C. Croze-Magnan's Mus?e fran?ais (1803-9). In 1785 he became an associate of the Acad?mie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, but he did not become an academician. He was a devout Roman Catholic and a staunch royalist, resuming his former title of Graveur du Roi with the restoration of the monarchy in 1814.