Unknown_Corot-2012

garden designer, André Le Nôtre ( 1613–1700 ). It was Le Nôtre’s alleys of trees and geometric parterres, and the views of the gardens and the Seine valley from raised terraces, that attracted visitors during the era in which Corot made this drawing. The château itself was used as a military penitentiary at the time. Corot’s drawing places the viewer in the ideal position from which to apprehend the gardens as originally intended by its designers: on axis and from an elevated viewpoint. Mansart’s pavilions were removed during the Second Empire, sometime after 1862 , when the façade was extensively restored—“put back somewhat ruthlessly,” in the words of Anthony Blunt—to its appearance under François I (Anthony Blunt, Art and Architecture in France 1500–1700 , New Haven, p. 53 ). The post- 1862 façade, with rounded turrets rather than polygonal pavilions, greets Saint-Germain-en Laye’s visitors today. As with many large-scale demolition and restoration projects undertaken during the Second Empire, the reworking of the façade at Saint-Germain en-Laye was recorded by photographer Charles Marville ( 1816–1878 / 9 ). One of the prints (Musée d’Archéologie nationale at Saint-Germain-en-Laye) offers a last look at Mansart’s north-east pavilion, and an oblique view of Le Nôtre’s stately prospect of trees, alleys, and distant terrace.