The image of Hercules against wallpaper printed with pastel colored nosegays is quintessential Napoleon III: Classicism taken past the height of decorative excess to the edge of ridiculous in exquisite quality, dubious taste, and with the maximum of ostentation.
I love these rooms in the Louvre’s Richelieu Wing for their gratuitous opulence, excessive detail and consistent visual clutter. I always feel I’m in a cinematic satire on “how the rich live.”
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