09 - Revolutionary
29 november 2004
David's the Death of Marat
Death of Marat (1793) by Jacques-Louis David (1748 - 1825)
Oil on canvas, 165 x 128 cm. Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels, Belgium.
Jean-Paul Marat (1743-93) was a 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.
Jacques Louis David was a fervent revolutionary and a personal friend of Marat. On 15 October that same year he presented the picture to the National Assembly. It became the symbol of the French revolution.
Posted by willy at 09:37 am to 09 - Revolutionary | Politics | Comments (0)
Main09 - Revolutionary
Delacroix's Liberty
Liberty Leading the People (28 July 1830), 1830 by Eugène Delacroix (1798-1863).
Oil on canvas. 260 x 325 cm. Louvre, Paris, France.
"Although I didn't fight, I'll at least paint for our country!"
With this painting Delacroix responded to the July revolution of 1830 against Charles X (king of France 1824-30) and absolutism in France, which finished with serious democratic reforms. As a result the new 'citizen king' Louis-Phillippe was elected and his power was restricted; France became a bourgeois monarchy. Delacroix wrote to his brother, a general: ‘Since I have not fought and conquered for the fatherland, I can at least paint on its behalf.’ To the left of Liberty, a man wearing a top hat, is Delacroix himself. The boy with pistols on the right was perhaps the inspiration for the character of Gavroche in Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables. The new king Louis-Phillippe bought the work for 3,000 francs, but never exhibited it.
Posted by willy at 09:22 am to 09 - Revolutionary | Politics | Comments (1)