"PLACES" STAY ROYAL

THE POWER SYMBOLS AT THE CENTER OF MAJOR PLACES

EVOLVE WITH CHANGING REGIMES

They all exalt the power of the regime. Their common origin: The equestrian statue of the king on pont Neuf bridge.

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At place de l'Étoile, the Arc de Triomphe exalts the victories of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic armies. Napoleon began it, the Restauration kings continued it to glorify an invasion of Spain, and Louis-Philippe finished and inaugurated it.

Internet, photographer not named

Louis Philippe hoped that making the Invalides the Emperor's sepulchre and completing the Arc (both in 1836) would connect him with Napoleon and so unite the people around his illegitimate rule (please click scroll down).

At place de l'Opéra the monument itself is the symbol, for it represents the regime (the Second Empire in the 1860's).

Claude Abron

An enclosed space, straight, converging streets and homogeneous architecture.

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At place Vendôme, La Commune destroys the column built to honor Napoleon's victory at Austerlitz (battle 1805, original column 1807) for its militarism (on May 16, 1871)...

"A monument to barbarity, a symbol of brute force and false glory, the victors' permanent insult to the vanquished [...]. The Vendôme column will be demolished." 

 -- Decree of Destruction 

Zoom

The painter Gustave Courbet said the figures look like "gingerbread men."

Preparation de la démolition, dernières mesures by Bruno Braquehais / zoom 

Souvenirs de la Commune: la colonne Vendôme démolie, anonymous, 1871 / zoom

La Colonne Vendôme démolie by Bruno Braquehais /zoom

It was supposed to have been made from cannons seized from the enemy, but Communards found only a thin layer of bronze.

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We see a copy. 

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Although set between the river and a street the Grand Courtyard of the Louvre cannot draw converging routes...

• The space is public, the architecture homogeneous...

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And the Pyramid evokes the State:

Entrée to Black Paris

Faced with an outcry against putting the contemporary work in the ancestral setting, the "Sun King of Socialism" — President Mitterand —  said, "I want it!" and the opposition answered the equivalent of "Oui, Sire" (in 1984).

President Macron celebrated his electoral victory with the Pyramid in the background (in 2017):

Image from widely-seen video 

The royal imprint,

a current event.

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Next,
Detour:

The violent imagery of victors on horseback