Étienne de Silhouette

Étienne de Silhouette (1709 - 1767) was French economist and finance minister under Louis XV, whose name became a byword for dark or outlined shadow portraits.

Life

De Silhouette was born July 5, 1709, in Limoges, France. His father Arnaud de Silhouette came from Biarritz on the Bay of Biscay, and had Basque origins. De Silhouette spent a year in London, where he studied the British economy and financial system. English authors Alexander Pope, Henry Bolingbroke, and William Warburton, and Spanish author Baltasar Gracián, were among those he studied. He was an adviser to the Parliament of Metz, secretary of the Duke of Orleans, a member of the commission for the regulation of Anglo-French interests in Acadia (now French Canada), and royal representative at the French India Company.

One of his works was Dissertations sur l'Union de la Religion, de la Morale, et de la Politique (1742), based on his translations of the above British authors, and influencing the Marquise de Pompadour enough to get him appointed contrôleur général des finances for the king on March 4, 1759. His job was to put the finances shattered by the Seven Years War back into order, and to accomplish that he introduced taxes on land, property - virtually anything within sight, including doors, windows, butlers, etc. - and other signs of wealth for the rich (the church was not taxed at that time); cut shortages of civil servants, and implemented other measures such as the melting of gold and silver goods under martial law. About his efforts he was alleged to have said "we shall tax them so heavily only their outlines will remain." A saying soon went about France, in which people who complained about the tax burden cried out "We are dressing a la Silhouette. We are shadows, too poor to wear color. We are Silhouettes!" Within weeks it was realized that the parsimonious de Silhouette was an incompetent; his draconian measures won fierce opposition, and he was released from his position on November 21, 1759, a mere eight months later. He then retired to Bry-sur-Marne, where he kept himself out of the spotlight until his death there on January 20, 1767.

Legacy

Numerous caricatures appeared in during his time as Minister of Finance and his name became synonymous with cheaply-made goods. He was told that he would decorate his castle of stinginess not with paintings, but with paper cutouts, which then came up as a cheap alternative to paintings. Indeed, de Silhouette did such simple art himself as a hobby. Critics would consider such art - the outlines of a human profile in deep shadow - as a cheap copy and the name "silhouette" transferred to it.