Chez Geoffrin - two paintings and two drawings of madame Geoffrin at home, by Hubert Robert, 1771

 

Madame Geoffrin (Marie Thérèse Geoffrin, née Rodet; 26 June 1699, Paris - 6 October 1777, Paris) was the host of a celebrated Salon - her bureaux d’esprit, as she called them - and is remembered as one of the leading female figures in the French Enlightenment. From 1750 to 1777, in her townhouse at what is now 374 rue Saint-Honoré, Madame Geoffrin received many of the most influential Philosophes and Encyclopédistes and the finest artists of her time. 

Un Artiste présente un portrait à Madame Geoffrin.

The reception was simple and unpretentious, but it was precisely this simplicity that allowed lively conversation to flourish, and which made it such a draw for the salon's habitués and those who clambered to be as such. Her dinners were held twice weekly. At first her invitations were extended to scholars who would gather every Wednesday. But later she welcomed artists on Mondays, which was seen as a novelty in the milieu of the Salon.

Le Déjeuner de Madame Geoffrin.

In 1771, Madame Geoffrin commissioned Hubert Robert to paint these two pictures depicting her in her home. The artist portrays a version of the salonnière faithful to the image preserved by posterity. She is simply dressed in a gray-blue gown and hair cap. In one scene, Madame Geoffrin listens to a reading by her servant; in the other, she examines a painting being presented to her. 

Her home was adorned with the work of artists who frequented her Mondays, and visitors to her home often placed commissions with those artists - the likes of Van Loo, Greuze, Vernet, Vien, and others - whose works were displayed on her walls. There has been much debate as to whether the man standing at the easel in the second painting is the artist himself, perhaps including himself as some attempt to demonstrate a familiarity with such an influential figure. But this is mere conjecture. At any rate, these two paintings would be the last commissions Madame Geoffrin placed with any artist.

It should be noted that Robert indulged in some artistic license when depicting these interiors, including artworks that do not appear in Madame Geoffrin’s inventories, editing out others that did, while other works appear likely to be pure invention.