Forward to 1.3.6 Romanticism A (1768-1826)
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Neoclassicism was a Western cultural movement in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that drew inspiration from the art and culture of classical antiquity.
Neoclassicism was born in Rome largely thanks to the writings of Johann Joachim Winckelmann, at the time of the rediscovery of Pompeii and Herculaneum, but its popularity spread all over Europe as a generation of European art students finished their Grand Tour and returned from Italy to their home countries with newly rediscovered Greco-Roman ideals.
[Source: Wikimedia commons]
[1350-10]
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | In 1751, James Dawkins and Robert Wood set out from Naples on an expedition to study the ancient city of Palmyra in Syria. Unlike previous military, diplomatic and trading missions to the region, this journey was dedicated to archaeological exploration. The trip was almost entirely funded by Dawkins who was the eldest son of Henry Dawkins (1698-1744), a wealthy sugar-plantation owner in Clarendon, Jamaica. The subsequent publication of their findings included detailed engravings of architectural remains that were previously almost unknown in western Europe. Here, Hamilton prioritises the central figures by clothing them in ancient costume and bathing them in glowing light. This contrasts with his representation of the other nationalities in the expedition party. [Source: nationalgalleries.org] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| James Dawkins and Robert Wood Discovering the Ruins of Palmyra | 1758 | Oil/Canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Hamilton, Gavin | 1723-1798 | Scottish painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-11] | |
| Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, 75 Belford Rd, Edinburgh EH4 3DR | 310 x 389 |
| The painting marks a turning point in the career of the painter and in the history of art. In a complete break with the light, shimmering, sensual art of the eighteenth century, it is truly an aesthetic manifesto. Four years before The Oath of the Horatii (below), probably David’s most famous work, was exhibited in the Louvre, David has here created the first neo-classical canvas. Belisarius was a Byzantine general of the sixth century, unjustly accused of conspiracy against Emperor Augustus. This is the old man in the foreground. He is reduced to begging after having his eyes gouged out. In the background is one of the soldiers who fought under his orders showing surprise as he recognises him. Under the historical and moral imperative that all glory and every heroic gesture is futile, there is a sharp criticism of the monarchy. This strong commitment from David was welcomed by philosophers of the Enlightenment period, such as Diderot. [Source: pba.lille.fr] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Belisarus Begging for Alms | 1781 | Oil/Canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-12] | |
| Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, Place de la République, 59000 Lille, France | 288 x 312 |
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | In 1785 visitors to the Paris Salon were transfixed by one painting, Jacques-Louis David’s Oath of the Horatii. It depicts three men, brothers, saluting toward three swords held up by their father as the women behind him grieve. No one had ever seen a painting like it. Similar subjects had been seen in the Salons before but the physicality and intense emotion of the painting was new and undeniable. The revolutionary painting changed French art but was David also calling for another kind of revolution – a real one? [Source: khanacademy.org] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Oath of the Horatii | 1784 | Oil/Canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-13] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 330 x 425 |
| In this landmark of Neoclassical painting from the years immediately preceding the French Revolution, David took up a classical story of resisting unjust authority in a sparse, frieze-like composition. The Greek philosopher Socrates was convicted of impiety by the Athenian courts; rather than renounce his beliefs, he died willingly, discoursing on the immortality of the soul before drinking poisonous hemlock. Through a network of carefully articulated gestures and expressions, David’s figures act out the last moments of Socrates’s life. He is about to grasp the cup of hemlock, offered by a disciple who cannot bear to witness the act. David consulted antiquarian scholars in his pursuit of an archeologically exacting image, including details of furniture and clothing; his inclusion of Plato at the foot of the bed, however, deliberately references not someone present at Socrates’s death but, rather, the author whose text, Phaedo, had preserved this ancient story into modern times. [Source: metmuseum.org] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Death of Socrates, The | 1787 | Oil/Canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-14] | |
| Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY USA | 130 x 196 |
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | A landmark of European portraiture that asserts a modern, scientifically minded couple in fashionable but simple dress, this painting was nonetheless excluded from the Salon of 1789 for fears it would further ignite revolutionary zeal. Lavoisier was a pioneering chemist credited with the discovery of oxygen and the chemical composition of water through experiments in which his wife actively collaborated. However, he was also involved in studies of gunpowder and a misunderstanding about his removal of this precious commodity from the Bastille in the summer of 1789 threw his alliances into question. This mishap and his status as a tax collector (the more prosaic means by which he funded his scientific research) led him to be guillotined in 1794. [Source: metmuseum.org] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier and his Wife, Portrait of | 1788 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-15] | |
| Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY USA | 258 x 195 |
 Image source: metmuseum.org |
| Vernet began this enormous painting with its more than one hundred figures and dozen horses in 1787, and he presented it as his reception piece to the Académie Royale in 1789. Exhibited at the Salons of 1789 and 1791, the painting’s ambition and advanced classicism proved a critical success. Vernet’s unusual format perfectly suits his subject: a procession that allegedly lasted three days, led by Roman general Aemilius Paulus who defeated King Perseus of Macedon in 168 BCE. The general rides in triumph on the gold cart followed by prisoners, including Perseus with his family. The temple of Jupiter Capitolinus with its hundred steps dominates the catalogue of ancient buildings that comprise the background. [Source: metmuseum.org] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Triumph of Aemilius Paulus, The | 1789 | Oil/Canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Vernet, Carle | 1758-1836, aged 78 | French painter Paris | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-16] | |
| Metropolitan Museum of Art NY USA | 130 x 489 |
| This winged young man who has just landed on a rock where a girl lies unconscious, is the god Eros (aka Cupid) and can be recognized by his wings and his quiver filled with arrows. The girl’s name is Psyche. Cupid’s mother Venus, goddess of Beauty, demanded that Psyche bring back a flask from the Underworld, strictly forbidding her to open it. But Psyche’s curiosity got the better of her; and no sooner had she breathed in the terrible fumes she fell into a deep, deathlike sleep. Seeing her lying motionless, Cupid rushed to her and touched her gently with the tip of his arrow, to make sure she was not dead. This is the moment caught by the sculptor: Cupid lifts his beloved Psyche in a tender embrace, his face close to hers. Psyche lets herself sink slowly backwards, languorously taking her lover’s head between her hands. Canova took his inspiration from a legend recounted by Latin author Apuleius in the Metamorphoses At the close of the tale the gods decide in council to grant Cupid Psyche’s hand in marriage, according her immortality and making her the goddess of the Soul. [Source: musee.louvre.fr] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss | 1793-4 | Marble | Sculpture |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Canova, Antonio | 1757-1822 | Italian sculptor | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-17] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 155 x 168 |
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | At the height of the Reign of Terror in 1793, David painted a memorial to his great friend, the murdered publisher, Jean Marat. As in his Death of Socrates, David substitutes the iconography of Christian art for contemporary issues. In Death of Marat, 1793, an idealised image of David’s slain friend, Marat, is shown holding his murderess’s (Charlotte Corday) letter of introduction. The bloodied knife lays on the floor having opened a fatal gash that functions, as does the painting’s very composition, as a reference to the entombment of Christ and a sort of secularized stigmata. Is David attempting now to find revolutionary martyrs to replace the saints of Catholicism (which had been outlawed)? [Source: khanacademy.org] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Death of Marat, The | 1793 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-18] | |
| Musée Royaux des Beauxarts, Rue de la Régence 3, 1000 Bruxelles, Belgium | 162 x 128 |
| Pinkie is the traditional title for a portrait of 1794 by Thomas Lawrence in the permanent collection of the Huntington Library at San Marino, California where it hangs opposite The Blue Boy by Thomas Gainsborough. These two works are the centerpieces of the institute’s art collection, which specialises in 18th-century English portraiture. The painting is an elegant depiction of Sarah Barrett Moulton, who was about eleven years old when painted. Her direct gaze and the loose, highly-movemented brushwork give the portrait a lively immediacy. [Source: janeausten.co.uk] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Sarah Goodin Barrett Moulton: “Pinkie” | 1794 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Lawrence, Sir Thomas | 1769-1830, aged 61 | English painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-19] | |
| Huntington Gallery, San Marino, CA USA | 146 x 100 |
 Image source: artsandculture.google.com | Canova was an exceptional sculptor who was active in the late 18th and early 19th century and based most of his work around Ancient Greece and Rome. The story behind one of Canova’s most famous sculptures is that Hebe was a daughter borne to Greek gods Zeus and Hera. Based on ancient Greek mythology, Hebe represented youth. Her role was to bring cups of nectar and ambrosia to provide everlasting youth and eternal life at feasts and events such as the Olympics, which is represented in this fine sculpture. [Source: antoniocanova.org] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Hebe | 1796-1817 | Marble | Sculpture |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Canova, Antonio | 1757-1822 | Italian sculptor | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-20] | |
| Museum Gipsoteca Antonio Canova, Via Canova, 74, 31054 Possagno TV, Italy | 166 |
| David began planning the work while he was imprisoned in the Luxembourg Palace in 1795. France was at war with other European nations after a period of civil conflict culminating in the Reign of Terror and the Thermidorian Reaction, during which David had been imprisoned as a supporter of Robespierre. David hesitated between representing either this subject or that of Homer reciting his verses to his fellow Greeks. He finally chose to make a canvas representing the Sabine women interposing themselves to separate the Romans and Sabines, as a “sequel” to Poussin’s The Rape of the Sabine Women. [Source: Wikimedia commons] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Intervention of the Sabine Women, The | 1798-9 | Oil/Canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-21] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 385 x 522 |
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | Henriette de Verninac came from a privileged background and a family which was heavily involved in the arts. She herself would be the subject of a number of portrait paintings and sculptures during her lifetime. It was Jacques Louis David’s portrait of her from 1799 that is the most memorable interpretation of her image. She looks thoroughly majestic in this painting, sat in a relaxed pose on a beautifully carved chair. The chair itself is placed sideways so that she can lean across the back and face the viewer. She wears a fairly simple but elegant white chemise gown, though with the addition of a mustard coloured cloth or scarf which may have been selected by the artist to add some extra interest to the scene. The background is simple and plain, just as with most of this artist’s portraits, as he did not want to create anything too busy that would lose the main focus. [Source: jacqueslouisdavid.net] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Madame Raymond de Verninac | 1798-9 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-22] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 1435 x 112 |
| Completed in four months, from October 1800 to January 1801, it signals the dawning of a new century. After a decade of terror and uncertainty following the Revolution, France was emerging as a great power once more. At the heart of this revival, of course, was General Napoleon Bonaparte who, in 1799, had staged an uprising against the revolutionary government (a coup d’état), installed himself as First Consul, and effectively become the most powerful man in France. In May 1800 he led his troops across the Alps in a military campaign against the Austrians which ended in their defeat in June at the Battle of Marengo. It is this achievement the painting commemorates. The portrait was commissioned by Charles IV, then King of Spain, to be hung in a gallery of paintings of other great military leaders housed in the Royal Palace in Madrid. [Source: smarthistory.org] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Napoleon Crossing the Alps | 1801 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-23] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 260 x 221 |
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | This Perseus, purchased by Countess Valeria Tarnowska of Poland, is a replica of Canova’s famed marble of Perseus in the Vatican, conceived about 1790 and first shown in 1801. Based freely on the Apollo Belvedere, which had been carried off to Paris under Napoleon, it was bought by Pope Pius VII and placed upon the pedestal where the Apollo had formerly stood. In the Museum’s version, Canova has refined the ornamental details and aimed for a more lyrical effect than in the Vatican Perseus, a stylistic streamlining characteristic of his artistic process. Medusa’s head is based on that of the antique Rondanini Medusa. [Source: metmuseum.org] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Perseus with the head of Medusa | 1804-6 | Marble | Sculpture |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Canova, Antonio | 1757-1822 | Italian sculptor | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-24] | |
| Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY USA | 243 x 192 x 103 |
| Pauline Bonaparte as Venus Victrix (Venus Victorious) is a semi-nude life-size neo-Classical portrait sculpture by the Italian sculptor Antonio Canova. It was commissioned by Pauline Bonaparte’s husband Camillo Borghese and executed in Rome from 1805 to 1808, after she married the representative of the Borghese family. Then, the sculpture moved to Camillo’s house in Turin, then to Genoa, only arriving to the Galleria Borghese around 1838. [Source: borghese.gallery] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Venus Victrix (Pauline Bonaparte) | 1805-8 | Marble | Sculpture |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Canova, Antonio | 1757-1822 | Italian sculptor | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-25] | |
| Galeria Borghese, Rome Italy | 92 x 192 x 76 |
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | The Coronation of Napoleon is a painting completed in 1807 by Jacques-Louis David, the official painter of Napoleon, depicting the coronation of Napoleon I at Notre-Dame de Paris. The painting has imposing dimensions, as it is almost 10 x 6m.The work is on display at the Louvre Museum in Paris. [Source: Wikimedia commons] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Coronation of Napoleon, The | 1805-7 | Oil/Canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-26] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 621 x 979 |
| The painting shows Napoleon as emperor, in the costume he wore for his coronation, seated on a circular-backed throne with armrests adorned with ivory balls. In his right hand he holds the sceptre of Charlemagne and in his left the hand of justice. On his head is a golden laurel wreath, similar to one worn by Caesar. He also wears an ermine hood under the great collar of the Légion d’honneur, a gold-embroidered satin tunic and an ermine-lined purple velvet cloak decorated with gold bees. The coronation sword is in its scabbard and held up by a silk scarf. The subject wears white shoes embroidered in gold and resting on a cushion. The carpet under the throne displays an imperial eagle. [Source: Wikimedia commons] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Napoleon I on His Imperial Throne | 1806 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Ingres, Jean Auguste Dominique | 1780-1867, aged 86 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-27] | |
| Musée de l’Armée, 129 Rue de Grenelle, 75007 Paris, France | 260 x 163 |
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | One of the more conservative figures in French painting of the 19th century, Ingres trained under Jacques-Louis David before winning the prestigious Prix de Rome in 1801. But despite his outstanding drawing, his style of neoclassical painting – which borrowed from Northern Renaissance art as well as the Italian Renaissance – proved to be out of step with the views of the French Academy and critics alike. The Valpincon Bather (La Grande Baigneuse), Ingres’ first great nude – was originally entitled “Seated Woman” before being renamed after one of its 19th century owners. It was one of the three paintings Ingres was required to submit for adjudication to Paris, while studying at the French Academy in Rome during his Prix de Rome. It was a slightly unusual choice of subject and critics were unimpressed. Ingres had already caused something of a stir at the salon with Portrait of Napoleon I on his Imperial Throne (1806, Musee de l’Armee, Paris), a work that was roundly condemned for its old fashioned qualities. And it was not until 1855 that The Valpincon Bather received the acclaim it deserved. [Source: visual-arts-cork.com] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Valpinçon Bather, The | 1808 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Ingres, Jean Auguste Dominique | 1780-1867, aged 86 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-28] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 146 x 98 |
| It was in 1799 that Jacques-Louis David began painting, Leonidas at Thermopylae. It took him 15 years to complete the work. The reason for this was that David stopped working on the picture in 1803. Left unfinished, it was ten years before he went back to working on the painting, completing it in 1814. The picture was a complementary work for another of David’s paintings, The Intervention of the Sabine Women. The subject of the picture is the Spartan king, Leonidas, before the Battle of Thermopylae. In comparison to the other figures who are in motion, Leonidas appears static. He is looking straight out from the picture, catching the viewers’ eye, drawing them into the moment of terror and pity at what lies ahead. The battle involved Leonidas and 300 volunteers, defending the pass at Thermopylae against an invading Persian army. It was a battle that led to them all being killed. [Source: .jacqueslouisdavid.net] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Leonidas at Thermopylae | 1812 | Oil/Canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| David, Jacques-Louis | 1748-1825, aged 76 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-29] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 395 x 531 |
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | Ingres returned to Neoclassicism after having first rejected the lessons of his teacher David. He could even be said to have laid the foundation for the emotive expressiveness of Romanticism. Here a languid nude is set in a sumptuous interior. At first glance this nude seems to follow in the tradition of the Great Venetian masters, see for instance, Titian’s Venus of Urbino of 1538. On closer examination, it becomes clear that this is no classical setting. Instead, Ingres has created an aloof eroticism accentuated by its exotic context. The peacock fan, the turban, the enormous pearls, the hookah and of course, the title of the painting, all refer us to the French conception of the Orient. (in this context the Orient means the Near East or North Africa). [Source: khanacademy.org] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Grande Odalisque, The | 1814 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Ingres, Jean Auguste Dominique | 1780-1867, aged 86 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-30] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 89 x 163 |
| The Death of Leonardo da Vinci or Francis I Receives the Last Breaths of Leonardo da Vinci is an 1818 painting by the French artist Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, showing the painter Leonardo da Vinci dying, with Francis I of France holding his head. It was commissioned by the Pierre Louis Jean Casimir de Blacas, the French ambassador in Rome, and now hangs in the Petit Palais in Paris. [Source: Wikimedia commons] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Death of Leonardo da Vinci, The | 1818 | Oil/Canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Ingres, Jean Auguste Dominique | 1780-1867, aged 86 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-35] | |
| Petit Palais, Avenue Winston Churchill, 75008 Paris, France | 51 x 40 |
| The Lion Monument in Lucerne is a giant dying lion carved out of a wall of sandstone rock above a pond at the east end of the medieval town. It was designed as a memorial for the mercenary soldiers from central Switzerland who lost their lives serving the French king Louis XVI. The revolutionary masses attacked the royal Tuileries castle in Paris in August 1792 and Swiss mercenary troops tried to defend the royal family and assist the royals to escape. |  Image source: lucerne.all-about-switzerland.info |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Lion of Lucerne | 1818-1821 | Sandstone | Sculpture |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Thorvaldsen, Bertel | 1770-1844, aged 73 | Danish sculptor | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-31] | |
| Lucerne | 1000 x 600 |
 Image source: wga.hu | Ingres was a life-long proponent of the primacy of line over colour. His service to art lay in his abilities as a portraitist and as one of the most important draughtsmen of the century. His portrait drawings are remarkable for their psychological empathy and the enormous subtlety with which light and surface area are treated. Ingres, himself a talented violinist, drew a portrait of Niccolò Paganini – at that stage at the very beginning of his career – probably as a reminder of concerts the two friends had performed together. [Source: wga.hu] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Paganini, The Violinist Niccolò | 1819 | Pencil | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Ingres, Jean Auguste Dominique | 1782 – 1849, aged 58 | Italian artist | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-32] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 298 x 218 |
| Orphan Girl at the Cemetery was painted in 1824 by Eugène Delacroix. The painting depicts a young girl visiting a cemetery, most likely located in the French countryside. Her tearful eyes are directed upward, toward heaven. Is she questioning God’s will? Does she look to understand why her loved one was taken from her? Her expression conveys not only sadness, but also emotional pain. The melancholic atmosphere is emphasized by the dimly lit background, the paleness of the sky and the dark, neglected graveyard, all of which suggest abandonment. The young girl’s posture implies resignation; her gaping mouth, the hand that lies lifeless on her knee, and the right arm that supports her body on the ground give the viewer a sense of hopelessness. Eugene Delacroix’s shadowing technique is masterful, from the nape of her neck to the wrinkles of her clothing. The background is slightly blurred, placing all the attention on the grief-stricken figure at the forefront of the canvas. [Source: eugene-delacroix.com] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Orphan Girl in a Cemetery | c1823-4 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Delacroix, Eugène | 1798-1863, aged 65 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-33] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 66 x 54 |
 Image source: louvre.fr | The painting depicts a group of nude women at a pool in a harem. It has an erotic style that evokes both the Near East and earlier western styles associated with mythological subject matter. The painting expands on a number of motifs that Ingres had explored in earlier paintings, in particular The Valpinçon Bather and La Grande Odalisque. [Source: Wikimedia commons] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Turkish Bath, The | 1852-9 | Oil/Canvas | Genre Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Ingres, Jean Auguste Dominique | 1780-1867, aged 86 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-36] | |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 108 (dia) |
| Joan of Arc at the Coronation of Charles VII is a retrospective look at the event from 1429. The work merges the style of Ingres’ teacher Jacques-Louis David with that of the troubador style. The scene is marked by ambient light, sumptuous objects and rich colours. In 1851, M. de Guisard, the state’s Director of Fine Arts, gave Ingres a commission of 20,000 francs for a painting of a subject of Ingres’s choosing. Ingres offered instead to fulfill the commission by finishing two paintings already in progress, Joan of Arc and a Virgin with a Host. Both were subjects he had depicted in earlier works. [Source: Wikimedia commons] |  Image source: Wikimedia commons |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Joan of Arc at the Coronation of Charles VII… | 1854 | Oil/canvas | History Painting |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Ingres, Jean Auguste Dominique | 1780-1867, aged 86 | French painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | [1350-34]
| |
| Musée du Louvre, Paris France | 240 x 178 |
 Image source: Wikimedia commons | This is widely considered to be Leighton’s magnum opus, showing his classicist nature. It is thought that the woman portrayed alludes to the figures of sleeping nymphs and naiads the Greeks often sculpted. Flaming June disappeared from view in the early 1900s and was rediscovered in the 1960s. It was auctioned shortly after, during a period that was difficult for selling Victorian era paintings. It failed to sell for its low reserve price of US$140 ($1,126 at today’s values). After the auction, it was promptly purchased by the Museo de Arte de Ponce in Ponce, Puerto Rico, where it currently resides. [Source: Wikimedia commons] |
| TITLE: | YEAR: | FORM: | GENRE: |
| Flaming June | 1895 | Oil/Canvas | Portrait |
| ARTIST: | DATES: | ORIGIN: | MOVEMENT: |
| Leighton, Fredric Lord | 1830 – 1896, aged 65 | British painter | Neoclassicism |
| LOCATION: | SIZE (cms): | ||
| Museo de Arte de Ponce, 2325 Av. Las Américas, Ponce, 00717, Puerto Rico | 120 x 120 |
Forward to 1.3.6 Romanticism A (1768-1826)
Back to 1.3.4 Rococo B – Back to 1.3.3 Baroque Index