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David was born into the family of a wealthy Parisian merchant on August 30, 1748. When the boy was about 10 years old his father, Louis-Maurice, died after a pistol duel. David's two uncles, François Buron (1731-1818) and Jacques- François Desmaisons (c.1720-89) who were both architects and building contractors, took care of the boy's upbringing. First he was educated at a boarding school and the Collège des Quatre Nations in Paris. When he decided on the career of an artist his uncles helped him to become a student of Joseph-Marie Vien (1716-1809), a professor at the Academy who had a reputation as a good teacher. As many young painters, David used his close relatives as his models, thus he painted both his uncles, his aunt Marie-Josephe, and his cousin Marie-Françoise, who had supported his wish to become a painter.
In 1766-1774 David studied at the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, in Vein's class. The goal of practically every Academy student was to win the premier student prize: the Grand Prix, or Prix de Rome. David took part in the competition every year starting from 1770, until at last in 1774 he finally won it with Antiochus and Stratonice. After that he spent 5 years in Italy (1775-1780), where drew from antique models. On his return to Paris in 1780, Ancient history and mythology became his favorite subject. In 1781 David was made an Associate member of the Academy for his work Belisarius, which was much admired, and two years later, in 1783, he became a full Academician for Andromache Mourning Hector. In 1784, he fulfilled Louis XVI’s commission - The Oath of the Horatii.
David enthusiastically greeted the French Revolution and from 1789 he actively participated in political life. In 1791 he was elected a deputy of the Convention from Paris. He voted for the death of Louis XVI in 1793 and supported Robespierre’s and the left radicals’ regime; David was a member of the Committee of Public Safety and artistic director of the great national fêtes founded on classical customs. After the 9 Termidor (27 July) 1794 coup, when Robespierre and his closest supporters were overthrown and hurriedly executed by the temporary coalition of both left- and right-wing moderates in the Convention, David was arrested twice and narrowly escaped with his life. His political career ended, but his artistic career revived. The most prominent work of the second half of the 1790s was The Intervention of the Sabine Women.
In 1797 he met Napoleon and was granted a single portrait sitting, during which David did not manage to paint much, but was absolutely captivated by Napoleon's personality. Later on David created many paintings devoted to his new hero and his relatives: Bonaparte Crossing the St. Bernard Pass (1800), Napoleon in His Study (1812), the grandiose canvases Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon I and Coronation of the Empress Josephine (1808), The Distribution of the Eagle Standards, etc.
In 1802 Napoleon founded the Legion of Honor, and David was made a Knight (or Chevalier) of the Legion (the first of the five ranks of the order) in December 1803. During the following years he would reach the third rank of the order, a Commander (or Commandant) of the Legion of Honor (1815).
After the fall of Napoleon and the Bourbon restoration David was banished in 1816 as a regicide, and fled to Brussels, where he spent his last 10 years. During this period he returned to mythological subjects and intimate portraiture. David died on 29 December 1825 and was buried at the Saint-Josse-ten-Noode cemetery, Brussels.
The influence of David was very high. He was an outstanding teacher; from his studio came Gros, Gérard, Ingres, and many others. The art of their teacher and their own influenced the European art until Impressionism.
Bibliography:
Jacques-Louis David. by I. Kuznetsova. Moscow. 1965.
David.
by Simon Lee. Phaidon. 1999.
Painting of Europe. XIII-XX centuries. Encyclopedic Dictionary.
Moscow. Iskusstvo. 1999.
Neoclassicism
(Art & Ideas) by David G. Irwin. Phaidon Press Inc., 1997.
Jacques-Louis
David, Revolutionary Artist : Art, Politics, and the French Revolution
by Warren Roberts. Univ of North Carolina Pr, 1992.
Jacques-Louis
David by Dorothy Johnson. Princeton Univ Pr, 1993.
Jacques-Louis
David: Empire to Exile by Philippe Bordes. Clark Art Institute,
2005.
Jacques-Louis
David's 'Marat' by Will Vaughn, Helen Weston. Cambridge University
Press, 1999.
Portraiture
in Paris Around 1800: Cooper Penrose by Jacques-Louis David
by Philippe Bordes. Timken Museum of Art, 2004.
Leonidas at Thermopylae. Leonidas,
Sparta’s King in 480-488 B.C., was the leader of the allied Greek troops
in the Battle at Thermopylae against the Persians. After the positions
of the Greeks were turned, Leonidas ordered his troops to withdraw, while
he himself with 300 Spartans stayed to defend the narrow Thermopylae Pass
to give the Greeks time. The heroic death of the Spartan detachment was
glorified in poetry and art.
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Leonidas at
Thermopylae.
Bibliography:
Lexikon der Antike. VEB Bibliographisches Institut Leipzig.
1987.
Jacobus Blauw (1756-1829) and Gaspar
Mayer were representatives of the new revolutionary government of the
Dutch Republic, called the Batavian Republic. They were to negotiate peace
after the French invasion of the Netherlands.
Blauw highly appreciated his portrait by David, he wrote, “My wishes
are at last satisfied, my dear David. You have brought me to life again
on the canvas; you have, in a way, immortalized me with your sublime brush”.
It was also a political act, by commissioning a portrait from the disgraced
artist Blauw evidently wanted to show his support to the more radical revolutionary
politics associated with David.
“Mayer, on the other hand, probably doubted the political wisdom of
having his portrait painted by David and found the whole episode highly
embarrassing, and never bothered to collect it from David's studio, where
it remained until the artist's death.”
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Portrait of
Jacobus Blauw. Portrait of Gaspar Mayer.
Bibliography:
David. by Simon Lee. Phaidon. 1999.
Comtesse Vilain XIIII (1780-1853),
wife of Philippe Vilain XIIII, who was ennobled by Napoleon in 1811. She
was lady-in-waiting to the Empress Marie-Louise. After the fall of Napoleon
she had to escape to Brussels, where David, also in exile, fulfilled the
portrait. In the portrait the Comtesse is with her five-year-old daughter,
Louise.
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Portrait of
the Countess Vilain XIIII and Her Daughter.
Bibliography:
David. by Simon Lee. Phaidon. 1999.
Count Stanislas Potocki
(1755-1821) Polish nobleman, collector and connoisseur. He met David in
Rome during his Grand Tour in 1779-80 and commissioned there his equestrian
portrait, which was finished a little later in Paris. Back in Poland, Stanislas
Potocki pursued a political career and held a number of offices; as minister
of education he helped to found the Warsaw University. His sons were in
Russian service and are remembered in Russian history.
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Portrait of
Count Stanislas Potocki.
Bibliography:
Famous Russians in the 18th and 19th centuries. St. Petersburg.
1996.
David. by Simon Lee. Phaidon. 1999.
Jean-Paul Marat (1743-93) French
revolutionary, radical politician, physician, physicist and journalist.
He studied medicine at Bordeaux, Paris, Holland and London; then practiced
medicine in England in the 1770s and in Paris from 1777. Simultaneously
he went into scientific research in optics and electricity and wrote several
scientific works. He was also interested in political issues; he joined
the Cordelier Club. In September 1789 he started publishing his radical
paper L’ami du peuple (The Friend of the People), which provoked
and justified revolutionary violence. In 1792 he was elected a deputy to
the Convention. With Robespierre and Danton he overthrew Girondins and
helped to instigate the Reign of Terror. He was already very ill and could
work only sitting in his bath, when on July 13, 1793 he was assassinated
in his bath by Charlotte Corday, who was later executed. See allso Sometimes
Strange Relations Happen…
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Death of Marat.
Bibliography:
History of the French Revolution. by Thomas Carlyle. Harper
& Brothers, NY
Chambers Biographical Dictionary. Chambers. 1996.
Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier
(1743-94) French chemist, born in Paris, known as the founder of modern
chemistry. To finance his investigations, he accepted in 1768 the office
of farmer-general of taxes. He built a large laboratory in which he discovered
the composition of air, oxygen, its importance in respiration, combustion
and as a compound with metals. A political liberal, he saw the great necessity
for reform in France but was against revolutionary methods. He frequented
the circle of the Trudaine brothers, where he met David. As a tax farmer
and Commissioner for Gunpowder, Lavoisier came under suspicion during the
Revolution and was executed during the Reign of Terror.
Marie-Anne Lavoisier, wife of Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier.
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Portrait of
Antoine-Laurent and Marie-Anne Lavoisier.
Bibliography:
Chambers Biographical Dictionary. Chambers. 1996.
Emilie Sériziat, née
Pécoul, married to a lawyer Pierre Sériziat, was sister
of David's wife, Marguerite-Charlotte David, née Pécoul.
David stayed in their country house after he was released from the Luxembourg
prison at the end of December 1794. The visit was stopped by the new arrest
in May 1795. The portraits of Emilie and Pierre is a demonstration of gratitude
and friendship. David showed the portraits at the 1795 Salon. He wrote:
‘Here is fodder for my enemies. I believe they will be forced to admit
that at least I have not yet lost my talent.’
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Portrait of
Emilie Sériziat and Her Son. Portrait
of Pierre Sériziat.
Bibliography:
David. by Simon Lee. Phaidon. 1999.
Mme Charles-Louis Trudaine,
wife of Charles-Louis Trudaine de Montigny (1765-94). Charles-Louis and
his brother, Charles-Michel Trudaine de la Sablière (1766-94), sons
of a wealthy financier, held important gatherings of the liberal and intellectual
elite at their grand town house in the Place Royale, Paris. David was a
constant visitor of the meetings and the ‘Trudaine Society’ helped to shape
his opinions. Though no great royalists, the both brothers were executed
during the Reign of Terror.
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Portrait of
Madame Charles-Louis Trudaine.
Bibliography:
David. by Simon Lee. Phaidon. 1999.
Marguerite-Charlotte David
(1765- ), née Pécoul, daughter of a building contractor Charles-Pierre
Pécoul; David and Margueerite-Charlotte were married on 16
May 1782 in the church of St. Germain-l’Auxerrois, close to Louvre. They
had 4 children: son Charles-Louis-Jules, born on 15 February 1783, son
Eugène, born on 27 April, 1784 and twin daughters, Emilie and Pauline,
born on 26 October 1786. After David voted for the death of Louis XVI in
1793, Mme David was so disgusted that she divorced him. The couple re-married
in 1796.
“In Napoleonic Paris David and his wife were hardly a splendid or striking
couple. The English novelist Fanny Burney called Madame David ‘a woman
of no sort of elegance… and if she ever possessed any beauty, it had deserted
her at an early period’, but in compensation she was clever, shrewd and
penetrating, yet prone to sarcasm.”
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Portrait of
Marguerite-Charlotte David.
Bibliography:
David. by Simon Lee. Phaidon. 1999.
View of the Garden of the Luxembourg Palace.
It is known that while in prison August - October 1794, David worked much.
Among other works he produced his one and only landscape a View of the
Garden of the Luxembourg Palace, painted from his prison window. The picture
in Louvre maybe that landscape, though many scholars doubt the authorship
of it.
See: Jacques-Louis David.
View of the
Garden of the Luxembourg Palace.
Suzanne Le Pelletier
de Saint-Fargeau, daughter of Louis Michel Le Pelletier de Saint-Fargeau
(1760-94), an aristocrat, who turned revolutionary and member of the Convention.
He voted for the death of the king, and was assassinated on the eve of
the king's execution. Given a splendid state funeral, Le Pelletier was
celebrated as a republican martyr and commemorated in a painting by David.
This work has not survived as Le Pelletier’s daughter grew up to be an
ardent royalist, she bought the picture and had it burnt.
See: Jacques-Louis David.
Portrait of
Suzanne Le Pelletier de Saint-Fargeau.
Bibliography:
David. by Simon Lee. Phaidon. 1999.
Brutus, Lucius Junius, nephew
of the last Roman King Tarquinius the Proud, participated in revolt against
his tyranny (see the related topic The
Rape of Lucretia) and after establishing of the republic was one of
the first two Roman consuls.
Brutus’ two sons started a conspiracy to restore the monarchy. The
plot was foiled and they were convicted and sentenced to death by their
father.
See: Jacques-Louis David.
The Lictors Returning
to Brutus the Bodies of His Sons.
Bibliography:
Titus Livy. The History of Early Rome. The Easton Press. 1978.
Plutarch. Biographies of Outstanding Greeks and Romans. Minsk.
1995.