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André Le Nôtre ou quand un homme peut en cacher un autre by Patricia BOUCHENOT-DECHIN – Château de Bénouville
André Le Nôtre or a man of two faces
André Le Nôtre was born 400 years ago (1613- 1700). History loves legends and Le Nôtre’s was written throughout his life. Relentlessly copied, like all great stories, it is a truly enchanting one. Once upon a time, there was a gardener, born in “the most abject misery” the Pope’s nuncio was to write upon his succession, astonished by the great fortune he had accumulated. In Rome, the rumour spoke of one million lira… It is true to say that the image of Le Nôtre with his spade and his hat in his hand, starting from nothing, owing all he had to Fouquet, chosen at the “Nuit de Vaux” to join the great Versailles project, is so captivating that it remains timelessly engraved. Yet when history surpasses fiction, it is History that must be re-established.
Patricia Bouchenot-Déchin
Associated researcher at the Château de Versailles research centre and the Versailles National School of Architecture laboratory, associated with the AM:HAUS (Modernism news: history, architecture, urban planning societies) research laboratory, Patricia Bouchenot-Déchin, member of the Versailles and Ile-de-France Academy of Moral Science, Art and Literature which she chaired from 2006 to 2008 and Chevalier des Arts et Lettres (Knight of Arts and Letters), is the author of, among other works, André Le Nôtre’s biography, the result of fifteen years of research. She was Commissioner at the André Le Nôtre en perspectives, 1613 -2013 exhibition, held at the Château de Versailles from the 22nd of October 2013 to the 22nd of February 2014.
Further reading :
André Le Nôtre, Fayard, 2013
André le Nôtre en perspectives, 1613-2013, Hazan/Yale University Press, 2013