French Images of America in the Age of Revolutions : The Visual History of a Colonial Mirage

Marking the 250th anniversary of the Franco-American Alliance, this book examines how "America" was imagined in France during the American, French, and Haitian Revolutions.

Marking the 250th anniversary of the Franco-American Alliance, this book examines how "America" was imagined in France during the American, French, and Haitian Revolutions. Rather than relying primarily on textual sources, the book places images—paintings, prints, maps, tapestries, and decorative objects—at the center of the analysis, treating them as active agents in shaping political and colonial imaginaries. By testing established interpretations against visual evidence, the author shifts our attention from America as a political ideal to a colonial project promoted through visual culture. Alongside this visual approach, the book adopts a broad transnational perspective informed by cultural transfers and global history, situating French representations of America within an interconnected Atlantic world centered on the Caribbean, and offering new readings of iconic representations, from Franklin and Washington to Toussaint Louverture and Atala. Ultimately, it demonstrates that colonial imaginaries, especially those associated with Nouvelle-France, continued to structure French perceptions of America long after territorial loss, revealing how images sustained a powerful colonial mirage across the revolutionary Atlantic world. This text is Ideal for those interested in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century art history, visual culture, Atlantic history, and the Age of Revolutions.