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Title Le Napolean
Description: In the third century BC, the Greek Philosopher Archimedes observed than if an object immersed in fluid weighs less than the amount of fluid it displaces it will rise. Still, it wasn't until August 23, 1782 – two millennia later – in a heated "race for the sky" that the world's first gas balloon first took flight in Paris, France. |
The moment was historic and the impact lasting. The scientific achievement of this feat and its auspicious timing on the eve of the French Revolution created: A general sense that the colorful globes marked the beginning of a new age in which science and technology would affect startling change…If human beings could break the age-old chains of gravity what other restraints might they cast off? The invention of the balloon seemed perfectly calculated to celebrate the birth of a new nation dedicated…to the very idea of freedom for the individual…[and] came to symbolize the new political winds that were blowing through France. What followed was a sweeping and enduring "balloonomania." For the next century, France would continue to dominate in producing world's the most famous balloons and balloonists. The balloon's name, "Le Napoleon," would have carried cultural significance for a contemporary observer in 19th-century France. "Le Napoleon" was auspiciously also the name of the world's first steam-powered battleship. French engineer, Staislas Charles Henri Dupuy de Lome (1816-1885) – known in posterity simply as Dupuy – completed production of the steamship in 1847 to world acclaim. In 1870 he forayed into balloon design. He then began engineering dirigibles, a "lighter-than-air craft that is both powered and steerable (as opposed to free-floating, like a balloon)." Notably, two dirigibles – identified by their "rigid structure" – flank either side of the "Le Napoleon" balloon. Though the poster precedes Dupuy's balloon engineering by five years, the balloon's name might suggest, if not an explicit connection to Dupuy, at least an implied nod to the master. The balloon imagery in this 1865 celebration for The Feast of Saint Napoleon is certainly no coincidence. Not only was France still immersed in its "balloonomania," but also, Napoleon Bonaparte himself had been a strong enthusiast for aeronautics. During his reign, Napoleon was the first French ruler to name an "Official Aeronaut to the Emperor." Additionally, On April 2, 1794 Napoleon established the Compagnie d'Aerostiers, the world's first military aviation unit. The emperor also employed balloons for celebratory occasions, including a balloon parade across the English Channel in 1810 to celebrate his marriage to Marie-Louise of Austria. Decades later, in this 1865 poster depicting the celebration of The Feast of Saint Napoleon, balloons stand as the focal point of the image: A large balloon floating in the center if the poster, displaying a banner that reads Le Napoleon, is flanked by two dirigibles. While there is an absence of any depiction of the sky or the ground, the poster still manages to create the allusion that the balloons have ascended up to the sky: The balloons' tops are inflated and their passengers wave their hats to the implied flock of spectators below. Notably, the subject of this poster is as much the 1865 Feast of Saint Napoleon as it is the general craze of "balloonomania" raging through French society at the time. |
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