18th century blog

Gunnebo slottsspel is an 18th century event held at the Gunnebo castle outside of Göteborg. From the website:

Gunnebo Slottsspel offers excellent 18th century musical entertainment, splendid costumes, inspiring lectures, historical food and stimulating dramatized guided tours. Be prepared for gun smoke and canons when the Swedish and danish troupes gather for the Kvistrum battle.

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I found this through a livejournal entry by Lisette la cousette. It’s a huge database of scanned fashion prints of which many are 18th century, and it’s absolutely fantastic! Click the picture to go to the livejournal entry where you follow the instructions to see the prints.

There’s a new 18th century related group on flickr, 18th Century Reenacting Events. Join and add lots of photos from different kinds of 18th century events!

39 screencaps from the second part of Gustav III:s äktenskap after the cut. You can find screencaps from the first part in the previous entry.

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Gustav III:s äktenskap
This is a Swedish mini-series from 2001 in two parts, about Gustav III and his wife during the time when they had their children. The first part builds largely on a rumor that the royal couple needed actual hands-on help to consummate their marriage, so it’s not entirely based on cemented facts. The second part is a bit more slow, and much darker. It’s obviously in Swedish, but English subtitles are available on the DVD.

I thought it was really great, and very beautiful. When I first started watching the acting seemed a bit stiff, but the feeling soon went away. Even my boyfriend who doesn’t have an interest in 18th century fashion really liked it. I thought the actor playing Gustav, Jonas Karlsson, was such a great choice. He is a very good actor and really looked the part.

I found some of the outfits a bit costumey looking, but there were many great ones as well and the overall effect was gorgeous. It’s also really beautifully filmed. I definitely recommend it!

Tons and tons of beautiful screencaps (69 of them!) after the cut. Screencaps from part two will be in a separate entry.

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“Axel von Fersen” by Herman Lindqvist
This is a biography of Axel von Fersen and contains information about his entire life. I found it very interesting although not extremely entertainingly written. There’s lots to learn about Fersen himself, but also about other people around him, such as Gustav III, and interesting anecdotes about 18th century court life. There are many excerpts from Fersen’s own diary for example.

The Fersen and Marie Antoinette question is controversial to some, but although it’s obvious that the author personally believes their relationship was sexual at least once, the book doesn’t state anything as absolutely true or false.

It’s definitely worth a read, both if you’re interested in Fersen or just 18th century life in general. The ending is really sad and horrible of course, because of his gruesome death. The book is available in Swedish and Finnish.

Lavinia Spencer by Sir Joshua Reynolds. Probably 1780s.

In keeping with the season here are some pictures of 18th century ladies dressed for winter.

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Self portrait with two pupils, 1785.

French painter Adélaïde Labille-Guiard on Wikipedia.

The art of Adélaïde Labille-Guiard

More paintings after the cut.

Edit: Updated this post with more paintings and better quality pictures.

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Jefferson in Paris
I’ve been wanting to see this movie forever because of the costumes and I finally got it on DVD! As a movie I found it kind of uninteresting but ok. Both of Jefferson’s romances seem completely unmotivated and unromantic, not very believable. The costumes make up for this a hundred times though, it’s an absolutely gorgeous movie. The costumes are unusually detailed and interesting, and though I saw a few bad wigs most of it looked wonderful.

The actress who played Marie Antoinette had a pretty good likeness. I think she looked most like the actual Antoinette than any other actress I’ve seen portraying her, although I think she looked quite a lot older and less classically beautiful than the real Marie Antoinette does in paintings from around this time. Then again Marie Antoinette is said to have aged quickly when the revolution came. The actor playing Louis XVI also looked much too old to me. In fact when I first saw him I thought he was supposed to be the old king and this confused me for a while.

I highly recommend watching it! More movie stills after the cut.

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Another 18th century related exhibition in Stockholm! This time it’s at Stockholms stadsmuseum and the exhibition is called Bellman, Sevenbom och Prinsessan. The description at the website says it’s about “filth, luxury and everyday life in 18th century Stockholm”. I have no idea what’s going to be shown, but it sounds great.

The Swedish national museum will exhibit over 100 paintings by Alexander Roslin from September 27 2007 to January 13 2008. There will also be two lectures. Click the portrait to go to the exhibition website.

“Lady and servant girl in late rococo costume. The lady’s hair is worn à la circassienne, the servant girl’s cap is called dormeuse”

Tidens Tøj

This an “Internet exhibition” of clothes ranging from the 1700s to the 1980s, and they have quite a lot of stuff in the 1700s section. The photos are great and there are even patterns for some of the clothes! The site is in Danish but I think you can figure out the navigation even if you don’t know the language. There are also long descriptions of every garment, but they’re in Danish too of course. You can see the clothes in real life at the Danish national museum.

Self portrait, 1795.

French painter Louis-Léopold Boilly on Wikipedia. The wikipedia article is pretty much empty though, so here’s another link with a short biography.

More paintings after the cut.

Edit: Updated this post with more paintings and better quality pictures.

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