Seventeenth-century Dutch and Flemish paintings were aesthetic, intellectual, and economic touchstones in the Parisian art world of the Revolutionary era, but their importance within this framework, while frequently acknowledged, never attracted much subsequent attention. Darius A. Spieth’s inquiry into Revolutionary Paris and the Market for Netherlandish Art reveals the dominance of “Golden Age” pictures in the artistic discourse and sales transactions before, during, and after the French Revolution. A broadly based statistical investigation, undertaken as part of this study, shows that the upheaval reduced prices for Netherlandish paintings by about 55% compared to the Old Regime, and that it took until after the July Revolution of 1830 for art prices to return where they stood before 1789.

C'est dans cette époque charnière de l'histoire de la culture européenne que s'organise le système moderne du marché de l'art et que se transforme la conception même de l'héritage artistique. Etudes réunies autour de trois thèmes : La circulation des oeuvres d'art : organisation, pratiques et enjeux ; Marchands et collectionneurs ; Paris et l'Europe : mouvements de mode et diffusion.