Jefferson's America & Napoleon's France: An Exhibition for the Louisiana Purchase Bicentennial

Thomas Jefferson and Napoleon Bonaparte, brilliant and complicated men, are among history's most fascinating figures. In 1803, the Louisiana Purchase brought the worlds of Jefferson and Napoleon together for a transforming moment in history. Americans are accustomed to thinking of the Louisiana Purchase as changing the course of American history. On the occasion of the bicentennial of this event, however, Jefferson's America and Napoleon's France places the Louisiana Purchase in the context of the greater Atlantic world of commerce and culture. The complicated cultural politics and special relationship between France and America at the time of the Louisiana Purchase are explored through paintings, sculptures, prints and drawings, documents, furniture, and decorative arts. Essays consider the personalities, issues, politics, and art of the time in depth, from Josephine Bonaparte's remarkable home and gardens at Malmaison to Thomas Jefferson's furniture made by enslaved joiners, and provide glimpses of the Native American cultures abundant in the Louisiana Territory. Victoria Cooke is curator of European painting, New Orleans Museum of Art. The other contributors are Gail Feigenbaum, Patrice Higonnet, Bill Mercer, David O'Brien, Jessie Poesch, Paul Staiti, Susan Stein, Paul Tarver, and Susan Taylor-Leduc.