Podcast 43 features a Boyd Cruise painting of  Le Pretre Mansion on Dauphine Street.

The pod returns! We’re organizing a bit more this year. The pod now features four-episode series. The paintings of artist Boyd Cruise kick this off. Episode 43 discusses Cruise’s painting of La Pretre Mansion.

The magnificent house at the corner of Dauphine Street and Orleans Avenue in the Vieux Carré is commonly known as the Le Prete Mansion. It’s also known as the Gardette-La Prete House, reflecting the historic marker on the building:

Erected 1836 for

While the Historic American Building Survey (HABS) – LA-53, contains detailed photographs and drawings of the house, it was artist Boyd Cruise who captured the feel of the corner, ante-bellum. Cruise painted the house in 1941. The work is typical of many from Cruise. He took the detailed HABS photos and visualized what the buildings looked like in the mid-ninteenth century. Here’s the caption for the work from THNOC:

Facade view of Le Pretre Mansion on Dauphine Street in the Vieux Carre. It was built in 1836 for J. C. Gardette by Frederick Roy. Pedestrians and a horse drawn carriage are visible in this mid-nineteenth-century depiction.

Look at the activity in the painting! It’s not just a writing prompt, but multiple ideas. Who’s the woman looking out from the third-floor gallery? What are the couple on the second floor discussing? Is the woman further down that gallery listening in on them, or watching something in the street? Is that the lady of the house in the doorway, greeting a visitor in the carriage? The coachman assists the rider out of the carriage while one of the household women (likely enslaved) watches from the sidewalk. Pedestrians pass by on the left-hand side of the scene. Another couple walks past the house on the right. A small boy takes in the activity while standing in the street. He likely waited to cross as the work wagon on the left passed him by.

Cruise’s attention to detail and fashion is exquisite. Such a talent, to turning photos and architectural drawings into human actions and movements.

The La Pretre Mansion ranks high on the “ghost tour” circuit, where it’s known as the “Sultan’s Palace.” We’re not big on these stories, but if you are, you’ll enjoy photographer/writer Michael Democker’s piece for Very Local on the house.

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