Although the French Revolution threatens to dominate all reflections of the eighteenth century, surely no exhibition of this era would be complete without some mention of this earth-shattering period.  It is possible to speak of the French Revolution as fantasy, for certainly the world up to 1789 had never experienced such a fantastic and cataclysmic series of events.   

The pieces culled from the Ackland and Wilson Library’s Rare Books Collection speak to the turmoil of the times, but through an imposed order of classical and allegorical symbols.  These in turn reveal the breakdown of the rational as their imaginary semi-historical depictions impose their own fantastical reality on the events of the era.  

A storm cloud of allegorical figures tumbles into The Oath of the Tennis-Court, while a tour-de-force of allegorical symbols threatens to overwhelm the viewer in The Triumph of the French Republic Under the Auspices of Liberty. By invoking classical imagery, allegory imbues the present with the authority of the past, making unstable current events appear already established.   Such detached and cerebral pictures were needed to uphold the moralistic image of the new Republic and its leaders above the gruesome reality of the Revolution.