Wearing Black: The Puys of Amiens or Elite Garments during the Renaissance

Urban Life
By Isabelle Paresys
English

The puys of Amiens series preserved at the Picardy Museum are a group of paintings devoted to the Virgin. When considered in combination with probates inventories, they are a remarkable and original source about the “clothing visual culture” of the urban elites. Between 1518 and 1618 the garments worn by the citizens of Amiens become shorter and more fitted and furs are less common, so the dressed body looks slighter. The dressed bodies also become significantly darker at the beginning of the 17th century. The stiffness and austerity of fashion displayed by the citizens are in keeping with the stylistic evolution of the puys. These paintings also deprive the bodies of their gestures and place them behind the king who is now present among his subjects. The clothing of the urban elites of the puys reveals a distinctive eloquence and shows a sobriety that gives them a well ordered unity asserting their identity of very catholic and loyal subjects of the Bourbon king.

Keywords

  • France
  • Amiens
  • Renaissance
  • clothing visual cultures
  • urban elites
  • identities
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