Louis Jean Desprez

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Louis Jean Desprez.
Lithograph
Copper tent in Hagapark
The Uppsala Botanical Garden
Gustav III's unfinished Great Castle Haga

Louis Jean Desprez ( baptized May 28, 1743 in Auxerre , † March 19, 1804 in Stockholm ) was a French architect, painter and graphic artist who worked mainly in Sweden .

Desprez was one of the many artists who Gustav III. were brought to Sweden.

biography

Desprez was born the son of wig maker Louis Mathieu Desprez and his wife Perette Bourbon. He was baptized on May 28, 1743, but the date of birth is unknown. At a young age he was sent to Paris , where he was employed by Jacques-François Blondel for some time and studied at the local architecture academy. Desprez married Anne de Vermale in 1774, from whom he separated two years later. In 1776 he also created drawings and engravings for the anthology Voyage pittoresque (Paris 1781–1786), which were ordered by the Abbé de Saint-Nons. In 1777 he moved to Rome , where he studied at the local French academy. This was possible because he had been awarded the Prix ​​de Rome scholarship the year before .

From Rome, Desprez undertook a study tour through southern Italy in 1778, during which he recorded many of the ancient and medieval buildings there in sketchbooks, which are now kept in the National Museum in Stockholm. The only surviving depiction of the ruins of the Frederician Donjon in the fort of Lucera , which Friedrich II von Hohenstaufen commissioned in the 1230s and which was completely demolished in 1790, comes from Desprez .

In Rome, Desprez was busy with decorations for the Alibertitheater, which drew the attention of the Swedish king Gustav III, who was in the city in 1784, to Desprez. He also drew templates for colored vedutas of Pompeii , which were sold to visitors to the excavation site.

Desprez followed Gustav III. at his invitation to Sweden and created new stage decorations in Stockholm with great personal sympathy from the king, who also gave detailed instructions. It turned out that Desprez had further fortunes in the fields of architecture , painting and graphics and he also became a fixture in Stockholm's social life, where he did not shy away from a brawl. He made headlines with several lovers, although he was officially married.

Architecturally, he was responsible for various buildings in Hagapark near Stockholm, but his largest project, the great palace in the park, was not completed because Gustav III. was previously murdered. His most important building is the orangery in Uppsala , which he constructed in 1787. In 1799 Desprez was appointed the first architect by the new King Gustav IV Adolf . In 1800 he erected the obelisk at Slottsbacken in Stockholm . Before his death, he managed to design a pompous funeral ceremony for Duke Fredrik Adolf (a brother of Gustav III), which he did not live to see. In the end, Desprez's fortune had shrunk so much that his bereaved relatives had to ask for an advance payment from the state for the simple burial at Jakobsfriedhof.

  • Copper tent in Hagapark , Louis Jean Desprez 'drawing from 1787

  • Ruins of the Donjon Frederick II in the fort of Lucera (Apulia); Drawing by Desprez from 1778

literature

Web links

Commons : Louis Jean Desprez  - album with pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Alexander Knaak: Prolegomena to a corpus work of the architecture of Frederick II of Hohenstaufen in the Kingdom of Sicily 1220-1250. Phil. Diss. Tübingen 1998, Marburg 2001, p. 24 ff.
personal data
SURNAME Desprez, Louis Jean
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French architect, painter and graphic artist
DATE OF BIRTH baptized May 28, 1743
PLACE OF BIRTH Auxerre
DATE OF DEATH March 19, 1804
Place of death Stockholm