Joseph "Joey Bottles" Bonaparte, ex-King, New Jersey Art Collector
April 28, 2017 10:28 AM   Subscribe

The National Gallery of Art special exhibit, "America Collects Eighteenth-Century French Painting," opens May 21. From the program notes: When Joseph Bonaparte, elder brother of Napoleon, arrived in the United States in 1815, he brought with him his exquisite collection of eighteenth-century French paintings. Put on public view, the works caused a sensation, and a new American taste for French art was born.

The story is even odder. After his little brother's final defeat, Joseph Bonaparte, former King of Naples and Sicily, and King of Spain, fled to Bordentown, New Jersey where he established a large country home filled with French art. His well-attended parties earned him the nickname "Joey Bottles"; these visitors, seeing his paintings, led to a boom in American interest in French painting.

The art he brought to America was at least his second collection. Bonaparte, apparently not much of a general but a pretty good critic, thought to build a museum in Madrid but as the British army closed in he fled with his Titians, Raphaels and quite a number of paintings belonging to the Spanish Royal art collection cut from their frames and rolled up. These were captured by the British, and Wellington sent them to his brother for inspection. Wellington's attempt to repatriate them to Spain was rebuffed by the newly reinstated king and this collection now hangs at Apsley House, in London, although some, including this Van Eyck are apparently elsewhere.
posted by PandaMomentum (8 comments total) 15 users marked this as a favorite
 
A+ title, would title again.
posted by Going To Maine at 10:32 AM on April 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


The fact that the nickname is real is the cherry on top.
posted by Going To Maine at 10:35 AM on April 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


Man, there's some good stuff in those links. From the "build a museum in Madrid" one for example.

Though it seems almost certain that Wellington was aware of Captain Wyndham’s "liberation" of Joseph Bonaparte’s silver chamber pot, Wyndham was allowed to keep it. Quite possibly since it would be rather embarrassing to return it to the Spanish government, and no one was the least bit interested in restoring it to Joseph Bonaparte. Captain Wyndham made a gift of Joseph Bonaparte’s silver jakes-pot to his regiment, the 14th Light Dragoons, who christened it "the Emperor." It was for that reason that the men of the 14th were thereafter sometimes taunted with the nickname "the Emperor’s Chambermaids."
posted by gusottertrout at 11:09 AM on April 28, 2017 [3 favorites]


This is a great post, I am so glad you made it! Excited to check out the exhibition when it opens. DC's art museums have been doing a lot of fascinating stuff lately (Kusama, Ragnar Kjartansson, Turquoise Mountain, etc), I'm happy to see the National Gallery right up there in the mix.
posted by everybody had matching towels at 11:20 AM on April 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


The random backstory is -- I stopped for lunch in Bordentown, just off the NJ Turnpike, a few years ago and read a plaque that mentioned Joseph Bonaparte (but sadly not his nickname), looked it up and parked it in the back of my head as a story worth using sometime. Imagine my surprise when I saw the DCist post about the upcoming NGA exhibit.

I still think someone should appropriate it for a novel -- there's also a story about him having an American mistress and kids, claiming to have seen the "Jersey Devil," the mansion catching fire and whether this was an accident or not, and how the people of Bordentown came and rescued all his stuff. I think some of the art in his house must have been copies -- there are claims that he had a Rubens, and a Mengs nativity scene, the latter, for sure, the original is at Apsley House. Or is it...
posted by PandaMomentum at 12:36 PM on April 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


Le Discret on the first link is just begging to be my Slack profile pic.
posted by lagomorphius at 1:18 PM on April 28, 2017


"Joey Bottles" sounds like a Jersey Mafia name. I had no idea that fine local tradition went back so far!
posted by mermayd at 5:23 PM on April 28, 2017


I live near here, and my father grew up in Bordentown. I've always heard the stories about Bonaparte, but I admit I've never dug too deeply. Your post finally got me to figure out where his estate was, and it was freaking huge. If I'm right, it's the area outlined in white here. There's a "Point Breeze" apartment complex in the northernmost portion, and a seminary in the southern part.
posted by mollweide at 6:07 PM on April 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


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