FRIDAY, DECEMBER 5, 2025 
This Week in La Gazette Drouot : What would Pascal Paoli have been without a great portrait?
A t last! The reappearance of a portrait of the famous Corsican statesman, painted by British artist William Beechey, is a major surprise crowning the celebrations of his tercentenary.
By Carole Blumenfeld
Read the full version of "What would Pascal Paoli have been without a great portrait?" in La Gazette Drouot
Imagine for a moment Napoleon I without the effigies bequeathed to him by Gros, Jacques-Louis David, François Gérard or even Ingres : if these images had lost their attributions and identifications for two centuries, how would we then appropriate this part of history, deprived of its most eloquent emblems ? On the other hand, it's curious to have managed to keep Paoli alive with just a few bust portraits, even if they were signed by Lawrence or Richard Cosway...
This iconographic rarity reflects the tormented destiny of a man whose exile never ceased to pursue him, from the inaugural uproar in the year he turned 14 , when his father paid the price for his resistance to Genoese authority in Corsica, to the last English refuge.
Imagine for a moment Napoleon I without the effigies bequeathed to him by Gros, Jacques-Louis David, François Gérard or even Ingres : if these images had lost their attributions and identifications for two centuries, how would we then appropriate this part of history, deprived of its most eloquent emblems ? On the other hand, it's curious to have managed to keep Paoli alive with just a few bust portraits, even if they were signed by Lawrence or Richard Cosway...
This iconographic rarity reflects the tormented destiny of a man whose exile never ceased to pursue him, from the inaugural uproar in the year he turned 14 , when his father paid the price for his resistance to Genoese authority in Corsica, to the last English refuge.
Read the full version of "What would Pascal Paoli have been without a great portrait?" in La Gazette Drouot
Imagine for a moment Napoleon I without the effigies bequeathed to him by Gros, Jacques-Louis David, François Gérard or even Ingres : if these images had lost their attributions and identifications for two centuries, how would we then appropriate this part of history, deprived of its most eloquent emblems ? On the other hand, it's curious to have managed to keep Paoli alive with just a few bust portraits, even if they were signed by Lawrence or Richard Cosway...
This iconographic rarity reflects the tormented destiny of a man whose exile never ceased to pursue him, from the inaugural uproar in the year he turned 14 , when his father paid the price for his resistance to Genoese authority in Corsica, to the last English refuge.
Imagine for a moment Napoleon I without the effigies bequeathed to him by Gros, Jacques-Louis David, François Gérard or even Ingres : if these images had lost their attributions and identifications for two centuries, how would we then appropriate this part of history, deprived of its most eloquent emblems ? On the other hand, it's curious to have managed to keep Paoli alive with just a few bust portraits, even if they were signed by Lawrence or Richard Cosway...
This iconographic rarity reflects the tormented destiny of a man whose exile never ceased to pursue him, from the inaugural uproar in the year he turned 14 , when his father paid the price for his resistance to Genoese authority in Corsica, to the last English refuge.
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