Essays

The Pursuit of Pleasure

Upon entering the ornate mansion lobby of the Dixon Gallery and Gardens, a visitor's gaze will fixate on large piece known as The Joyous Festival. Completed in 1906 by French painter Gaston La Touche, The Joyous Festival invites the viewer into a beautiful evening festival of lights.

The painting depicts an extravagant party with revelers who dance with lanterns on a patio under the smoke and spark of fireworks. The palace of Versailles serves as a backdrop, along with a dark basin that reflects the many lanterns used in the celebration. Floating alongside the patio is a gondola with other party-goers and a handful of musicians. The people in the painting are smiling and indulging in fantastic pleasures, dressed in luxurious gowns and suits. The Joyous Festival is a nod to ancien régime of France, the time prior to the infamous French Revolution. With The Joyous Festival, La Touche recalls France during the era of Louis the XVI when the aristocracy of France is reveling in their splendor while the rest of the city was in an uproar of rebellion due to hearse living conditions. However, La Touche does not seem to cast judgement on the carefree aristocrats, but rather portrays the dramatic extravaganza as a lovely and romantic event and nothing else.

The Joyous Festival, with its rich, warm colors, is a stark contrast to the green wall from which it hangs. An oil on canvas, the piece hangs in a thin, unassuming golden frame. The painting is large yet it hangs low enough for the viewer to see the characters at eye level, as if looking onto the party from a short distance.

La Touche's use of color and light are effective in adding to the romantic and 'joyous' aura of the piece. Reds, oranges, and yellows seem to melt together with the soft glow of the lanterns, making the entire piece appear to seem alight. The dark blues and greys for the shadows and distance hill add contrast and are meant to not distract the viewer from the focal point. The implied lines direct the viewers' attention around the piece to the two focal points of the artwork. A plume of firework smoke cuts vertically through the center of the piece, pointing to the gondola of party-goers. The ring of lanterns encircling the gondola point horizontally to the four dancers on the patio. The four dancers are the main focal point, with the glow of the lanterns illuminating their bodies and creating emphasis. The colors used around the dancers and on the dancers are lighter, drawing your attention first to them. The gondola is a secondary focal point, the lanterns encircling the boat being the only source of light in the gondola. The gondola and its occupants are in the shadows, enjoying the dark. There is asymmetrical balance due to the prominent light on the left side of the artwork, along with the heavier focus. The scale of the patio dancers pushes them closer to the viewers' eye, which adds to the heavy focus on the left side of the artwork. The right side of the piece is shadowed and serves to direct your attention to the left side of the piece.

The rich colors and lighting, dramatic and lavish content, and romantic nature of the artwork adds to the loveliness of the affair. The smiling, glowing faces and flowing dresses enforces the idea of the pursuit of pleasure. From analyzing La Touche's marvelous piece, I feel that I have gained a better grasp of the meaning of each term we have studied this semester, along with a sense of wonder at what it would have been like to have been at an event such as the one in The Joyous Festival.