DELACROIX THE ROMANTIC Part One A member of the famous Bohemian crowd of French avant-garde art, Delacroix was considered the rebellious leader of French Romanticism. Like all artists of his generation, he had missed out on Napoléonic glory but found excitement in the...
INGRES, THE NUDES, AND CONSPICUOUS CONSUMPTION Part Two By the middle of his artistic life, Ingres had reached the pinnacle of his career as the ruler of the Academy in France. Although the artist claimed to uphold the principles of classical art, his approach to the...
FINDING THE AVANT-GARDE Theory of the Avant-Garde In his book, The Theory of the Avant-Garde (1984), Peter Bürger stressed the historical basis of the avant-garde. The rise of the avant-garde was directly linked to the rise of the middle class and its allegiance to...
THE MODERNISM OF INGRES Part One Often assumed to be the bastion of conservatism in French art, Ingres was actually an astute observer of his own time and was, therefore, thoroughly modern. Like Gros and Girodet, Ingres had to find his own way past both his teacher,...
FOUNDING ROMANTICISM Part Two Two of the founding members of French Romanticism, Gros and Girodet, were Napoléonic artists who specialized in military glory and romantic escapism, respectively. Although they were both followers of David, both artists moved away from...
ROMANTICISM AS HISTORY IN FRANCE Neoclassicism was a historicist revival of an ancient style that acquired political and social implications during a time of turbulent change. Calm and serene, Neoclassicism lent itself well to noble subject matter that depicted the...
