Transcript Neoclassicism and History Painting

Neoclassicism and
History Painting
What are the proper subjects of large scale
paintings?
important scenes from history
scenes from The Bible
mythological scenes
Gustave Courbet
Burial at Ornans
1849-50
oil on canvas, approx. 10’ x 20’
This work by Courbet was intended as a “history” painting, but the
subject of this painting is the burial of a lower middle class
person….not a hero…the public was outraged by Courbet’s
audacity….
Jacques-Louis David
The Oath of the Horatii
1784
Oil on canvas, 330 x 425 cm
Musée du Louvre, Paris
This work is an
excellent example of
Neoclassicism. Why?
Essentially. This
image represents a
made-up event.
Louis XVI (and
France’s minister of
the arts Count
d’Angiviller) believed
that art should
improve public
morals.
What is this image
meant to teach he
viewer?
Jacques-Louis David
The Oath of the Horatii
1784
Oil on canvas, 330 x 425 cm
Musée du Louvre, Paris
Note: it was the Sons of
Horace—the Horatii
(Rome) versus the Curatii
(Alba); the women have
conflicting ties: one is a
sister of one of the Curatii
but is married to a Horatii,
one is engaged to a
Curatii….
Benjamin West
The Death of General Wolfe 1770
Oil on canvas, 152,6 x 214,5 cm
West made this image about a decisive battle fought at Quebec City in
1759 almost ten years later.
What is West trying to argue about the British army to England in The
Death of General Wolfe?
What has West deliberately altered to dramatize the moment and create a
sense of heightened response in the viewer?
Answers: Wolfe has sacrificed himself for the good of the state—for Britain in it’s battle for territory against the French
Answers: Wolfe dies in the middle of the entire British army (not under a tree with a few attendants); Wolfe dies under a dramatic sky that (in a moment
of pathetic fallacy) seems dark with grief (and the smoke from the battle); West throws in a Native-American to add an element of the “exotic” even
thought the Native-Americans fought on the French side…
John Trumbull
The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker’s Hill, June 17, 1775
1786 oil on canvas
John Trumbull
The Death of General Warren
Trumbull made this image about a decisive battle fought at Breed’s Hill in
1786 almost ten years later.
What is Trumbull trying to argue to a new country—a fledgling
democracy-- in The Death of General Warren?
For what was this painting intended to be used?
How has Trumbull deliberately structured the scene to dramatize the
moment and create a sense of heightened response in the viewer?
How many important personages are crammed in this scene?
Is this work Neoclassical in nature?
John Singleton Copley
Samuel Adams
c. 1770-1772
Oil on canvas
March 5, 1770—the Boston
Massacre (really a street
fight between colonial
ruffians and British
soldiers); the day after,
Adams demanded that
Governor Hutchinson—the
representative of the
crown—remove all British
troops from the city of
Boston.
This image was painted
shortly after the event.
What is Copley trying to
argue to the colonialists?
Jacques-Louis David
The Death of Marat
1793
Oil on canvas, 162 x 128 cm
approx 5’ x 4’
A supreme example of both
Neoclassicism as well as
history painting…Why?
Jacques-Louis David
Head of the Dead Marat
1793
Pen, black and brown ink, 270 x
210 mm
Musée National du Château,
Versailles
Jacques-Louis David
The Death of Socrates 1787
A supreme example of both Neoclassicism as well as history painting…Why?
Portraits
Neoclassical or Romantic?
Jacques-Louis David
Portrait of Antoine-Laurent and
Marie-Anne Lavoisier
1788
Oil on canvas, 256 x 195 cm
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
This work portrays one of the
ideals of the Enlightenment:
have faith in reason and
empirical knowledge; after her
marriage to Antoine-Laurent,
Marie-Anne soon became
interested in his scientific
research and began to actively
participate in his laboratory
work; the majority of the
research effort put forth in the
laboratory was done by both
together—and despite all this,
Marie-Anne still was able to
remain decorative….
Jacques-Louis David
Portrait of the Marquise d'Orvilliers
1790
Oil on canvas, 131 x 98 cm
Musée du Louvre, Paris
Jacques-Louis David
Portrait of Madame Adélaide Pastoret
1791-92
Oil on canvas, 130 x 97 cm
Art Institute, Chicago
Jacques-Louis David
Madame Raymond de Verninac
1798-99
Oil on canvas, 145 x 112 cm
Jacques-Louis David
Madame Récamier
Oil on canvas 173 x 244 cm
1800
Musée du Louvre, Paris
Élisabeth Vigee-Lebrun
Portrait of Anna Pitt as Hebe
1792
Oil on canvas, 140 x 100cm
The Hermitage, St. Petersburg
Hebe is the goddess of youth;
she is the daughter of Zeus and
Hera.
Is this a Neoclassical painting?
Joshua Reynolds
Mrs. Musters as Hebe
1785
Oil on canvas, 239 x 144,8 cm
Hebe is the goddess of youth;
she is the daughter of Zeus and
Hera.
Is this a Neoclassical painting?
Joshua Reynolds
Lady Elizabeth Delmé and her
Children
1777-80
Oil on canvas, 239 x 147 cm
Is this a Neoclassical painting?
Is it a Romantic painting?
Is this a “good mother” painting?
Élisabeth Vigee-Lebrun
Self-Portrait with Her
Daughter, Julie
1786
Oil on wood, 105 x 84 cm
Is this a Neoclassical
painting?
Is it a Romantic painting?
Is this a “good mother”
painting?
Élisabeth Vigee-Lebrun
Marie Antoinette with Her
Children
1787
oil on canvas
Is it a Romantic painting?
Is this a “good mother”
painting?
Is this a “history” painting?
Thomas Gainsborough
Mr. and Mrs. Andrews
1748-49
Thomas Gainsborough
Mr. and Mrs. William Hallett
(The Morning Walk)
1785
Does this work emphasize
one of the new values of the
Enlightenment: the
emphasis on nature and the
natural as a source of
goodness and beauty?
Romanticism
Romanticism is a complex artistic, literary, and intellectual
movement that originated in the second half of the 18th
century in Western Europe.
In part, it was a revolt against aristocratic social and
political norms of the Age of Enlightenment and a reaction
against the scientific rationalization of nature, and was
embodied most strongly in the visual arts, music, and
literature, but can be detected even in changed attitudes
towards children and education.
The movement validated strong emotion as an
authentic source of aesthetic experience, placing new
emphasis on such emotions as trepidation, terror, horror and
awe—especially that which is experienced in confronting the
sublimity of untamed nature and its picturesque qualities, both
new aesthetic categories.
Romanticism
In European painting, led by a new generation of the French
school, the Romantic sensibility contrasted with the
neoclassicism being taught in the academies.
In a revived clash between color and design, the
expressiveness of color, as in works of Turner, Gericault, and
Delacroix, was emphasized in the new prominence of the
brushstroke and impasto and in the artist's free handling of
paint, which tended to be repressed in neoclassicism under a
self-effacing finish.
In literature—among others—Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel
Hawthorne, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, William
Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Blake, Lord
Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Mary Shelley, and John Keats.
To come…genre painting…and wacky Fuseli…not the
pasta….
Important Artists still to come….
William Hogarth
Joseph Wright
John Henry Fuseli
Jean Baptiste Greuze