1.
Jacques-Louis David
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Jacques-Louis David was a French painter in the Neoclassical style, considered to be the preeminent painter of the era. David later became a supporter of the French Revolution and friend of Maximilien Robespierre. Imprisoned after Robespierres fall from power, he aligned himself with yet another political regime upon his release, at this time he developed his Empire style, notable for its use of warm Venetian colours. After Napoleons fall from Imperial power and the Bourbon revival, David exiled himself to Brussels, then in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, where he remained until his death. David had a number of pupils, making him the strongest influence in French art of the early 19th century. Jacques-Louis David was born into a family in Paris on 30 August 1748. When he was nine his father was killed in a duel. He covered his notebooks with drawings, and he said, I was always hiding behind the instructors chair. Soon, he desired to be a painter, but his uncles and he overcame the opposition, and went to learn from François Boucher, the leading painter of the time, who was also a distant relative. Boucher was a Rococo painter, but tastes were changing, Boucher decided that instead of taking over Davids tutelage, he would send David to his friend, Joseph-Marie Vien, a painter who embraced the classical reaction to Rococo. There David attended the Royal Academy, based in what is now the Louvre, each year the Academy awarded an outstanding student the prestigious Prix de Rome, which funded a three- to five-year stay in the Eternal City. Each pensionnaire was lodged in the French Academys Roman outpost, which from the years 1737 to 1793 was the Palazzo Mancini in the Via del Corso. David competed for, and failed to win, the prize for three years, each failure contributing to his lifelong grudge against the institution. After his second loss in 1772, David went on a hunger strike, confident he now had the support and backing needed to win the prize, he resumed his studies with great zeal—only to fail to win the Prix de Rome again the following year. Finally, in 1774, David was awarded the Prix de Rome on the strength of his painting of Erasistratus Discovering the Cause of Antiochus Disease, a subject set by the judges. In October 1775 he made the journey to Italy with his mentor, Joseph-Marie Vien, while in Italy, David especially studied the works of 17th-century masters such as Poussin, Caravaggio, and the Carracci. Mengs principled, historicizing approach to the representation of classical subjects profoundly influenced Davids pre-revolutionary painting, such as The Vestal Virgin, mengs also introduced David to the theoretical writings on ancient sculpture by Johann Joachim Winckelmann, the German scholar held to be the founder of modern art history. In 1779, David toured the newly excavated ruins of Pompeii, while in Rome, David also assiduously studied the High Renaissance painters, Raphael making a profound and lasting impression on the young French artist
2.
Louvre
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The Louvre or the Louvre Museum is the worlds largest museum and a historic monument in Paris, France. A central landmark of the city, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the citys 1st arrondissement, approximately 38,000 objects from prehistory to the 21st century are exhibited over an area of 72,735 square metres. The Louvre is the second most visited museum after the Palace Museum in China. The museum is housed in the Louvre Palace, originally built as a fortress in the late 12th century under Philip II, remnants of the fortress are visible in the basement of the museum. Due to the expansion of the city, the fortress eventually lost its defensive function and. The building was extended many times to form the present Louvre Palace, in 1692, the building was occupied by the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres and the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, which in 1699 held the first of a series of salons. The Académie remained at the Louvre for 100 years, during the French Revolution, the National Assembly decreed that the Louvre should be used as a museum to display the nations masterpieces. The museum opened on 10 August 1793 with an exhibition of 537 paintings, because of structural problems with the building, the museum was closed in 1796 until 1801. The collection was increased under Napoleon and the museum renamed Musée Napoléon, the collection was further increased during the reigns of Louis XVIII and Charles X, and during the Second French Empire the museum gained 20,000 pieces. Holdings have grown steadily through donations and bequests since the Third Republic, whether this was the first building on that spot is not known, it is possible that Philip modified an existing tower. According to the authoritative Grand Larousse encyclopédique, the name derives from an association with wolf hunting den, in the 7th century, St. Fare, an abbess in Meaux, left part of her Villa called Luvra situated in the region of Paris to a monastery. This territory probably did not correspond exactly to the modern site, the Louvre Palace was altered frequently throughout the Middle Ages. In the 14th century, Charles V converted the building into a residence and in 1546, Francis acquired what would become the nucleus of the Louvres holdings, his acquisitions including Leonardo da Vincis Mona Lisa. After Louis XIV chose Versailles as his residence in 1682, constructions slowed, however, on 14 October 1750, Louis XV agreed and sanctioned a display of 96 pieces from the royal collection, mounted in the Galerie royale de peinture of the Luxembourg Palace. Under Louis XVI, the museum idea became policy. The comte dAngiviller broadened the collection and in 1776 proposed conversion of the Grande Galerie of the Louvre – which contained maps – into the French Museum, many proposals were offered for the Louvres renovation into a museum, however, none was agreed on. Hence the museum remained incomplete until the French Revolution, during the French Revolution the Louvre was transformed into a public museum. In May 1791, the Assembly declared that the Louvre would be a place for bringing together monuments of all the sciences, on 10 August 1792, Louis XVI was imprisoned and the royal collection in the Louvre became national property
3.
Paris
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Paris is the capital and most populous city of France. It has an area of 105 square kilometres and a population of 2,229,621 in 2013 within its administrative limits, the agglomeration has grown well beyond the citys administrative limits. By the 17th century, Paris was one of Europes major centres of finance, commerce, fashion, science, and the arts, and it retains that position still today. The aire urbaine de Paris, a measure of area, spans most of the Île-de-France region and has a population of 12,405,426. It is therefore the second largest metropolitan area in the European Union after London, the Metropole of Grand Paris was created in 2016, combining the commune and its nearest suburbs into a single area for economic and environmental co-operation. Grand Paris covers 814 square kilometres and has a population of 7 million persons, the Paris Region had a GDP of €624 billion in 2012, accounting for 30.0 percent of the GDP of France and ranking it as one of the wealthiest regions in Europe. The city is also a rail, highway, and air-transport hub served by two international airports, Paris-Charles de Gaulle and Paris-Orly. Opened in 1900, the subway system, the Paris Métro. It is the second busiest metro system in Europe after Moscow Metro, notably, Paris Gare du Nord is the busiest railway station in the world outside of Japan, with 262 millions passengers in 2015. In 2015, Paris received 22.2 million visitors, making it one of the top tourist destinations. The association football club Paris Saint-Germain and the rugby union club Stade Français are based in Paris, the 80, 000-seat Stade de France, built for the 1998 FIFA World Cup, is located just north of Paris in the neighbouring commune of Saint-Denis. Paris hosts the annual French Open Grand Slam tennis tournament on the red clay of Roland Garros, Paris hosted the 1900 and 1924 Summer Olympics and is bidding to host the 2024 Summer Olympics. The name Paris is derived from its inhabitants, the Celtic Parisii tribe. Thus, though written the same, the name is not related to the Paris of Greek mythology. In the 1860s, the boulevards and streets of Paris were illuminated by 56,000 gas lamps, since the late 19th century, Paris has also been known as Panam in French slang. Inhabitants are known in English as Parisians and in French as Parisiens and they are also pejoratively called Parigots. The Parisii, a sub-tribe of the Celtic Senones, inhabited the Paris area from around the middle of the 3rd century BC. One of the areas major north-south trade routes crossed the Seine on the île de la Cité, this place of land and water trade routes gradually became a town
4.
Neoclassicism
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The main Neoclassical movement coincided with the 18th-century Age of Enlightenment, and continued into the early 19th century, laterally competing with Romanticism. In architecture, the style continued throughout the 19th, 20th, European Neoclassicism in the visual arts began c.1760 in opposition to the then-dominant Baroque and Rococo styles. Each neo-classicism selects some models among the range of classics that are available to it. They ignored both Archaic Greek art and the works of Late Antiquity, the Rococo art of ancient Palmyra came as a revelation, through engravings in Woods The Ruins of Palmyra. While the movement is described as the opposed counterpart of Romanticism. The case of the main champion of late Neoclassicism, Ingres, demonstrates this especially well. The revival can be traced to the establishment of formal archaeology, the writings of Johann Joachim Winckelmann were important in shaping this movement in both architecture and the visual arts. With the advent of the Grand Tour, a fad of collecting antiquities began that laid the foundations of many great collections spreading a Neoclassical revival throughout Europe, Neoclassicism in each art implies a particular canon of a classical model. In English, the term Neoclassicism is used primarily of the arts, the similar movement in English literature. This, which had been dominant for decades, was beginning to decline by the time Neoclassicism in the visual arts became fashionable. Though terms differ, the situation in French literature was similar, in music, the period saw the rise of classical music, and Neoclassicism is used of 20th-century developments. Ingress coronation portrait of Napoleon even borrowed from Late Antique consular diptychs and their Carolingian revival, much Neoclassical painting is more classicizing in subject matter than in anything else. A fierce, but often very badly informed, dispute raged for decades over the merits of Greek and Roman art, with Winckelmann. The work of artists, who could not easily be described as insipid, combined aspects of Romanticism with a generally Neoclassical style. Unlike Carstens unrealized schemes, the etchings of Giovanni Battista Piranesi were numerous and profitable and his main subject matter was the buildings and ruins of Rome, and he was more stimulated by the ancient than the modern. Neoclassicism in painting gained a new sense of direction with the success of Jacques-Louis Davids Oath of the Horatii at the Paris Salon of 1785. Despite its evocation of republican virtues, this was a commission by the royal government, David managed to combine an idealist style with drama and forcefulness. David rapidly became the leader of French art, and after the French Revolution became a politician with control of government patronage in art
5.
Couch
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Although a couch is used primarily for seating, it may be used for sleeping. In homes, couches are normally found in the room, living room, den. They are sometimes found in nonresidential settings such as hotels, lobbies of commercial offices, waiting rooms. The term couch is used in North America, South Africa, the word originated in Middle English from the Old French noun couche, which derived from the verb meaning to lie down. It originally denoted an item of furniture for lying or sleeping on, somewhat like a chaise longue, other terms which can be synonymous with the above definition are chesterfield, divan, davenport, lounge, and canapé. The word sofa is from Turkish derived from the Arabic word suffa for wool, the word settee comes from the Old English word, setl, which was used to describe long benches with high backs and arms, but is now generally used to describe upholstered seating. The most common types of couches are the loveseat, designed for seating two persons, and the sofa, with two or more cushion seats, other variants include the divan, the fainting couch and the canapé. To conserve space, some sofas double as beds in the form of sofa beds, daybeds, in the United Kingdom and Ireland, the term couch is rarely used, the terms sofa or settee being more common. A furniture set consisting of a sofa with two matching chairs, is known as a chesterfield suite or living room suite. Also in the UK, the word chesterfield meant any couch in the 1900s, the first leather chesterfield sofa, with its distinctive deep buttoned, quilted leather upholstery and lower seat base, was commissioned by Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield. A couch consists of the frame, the padding and the covering, the frame is usually made of wood but can also be made of steel, plastic or laminated boards. The wood used under the upholstery is made from kiln-dried maple wood that is free of knots, the show wood of the legs, arms and back can be maple, mahogany, walnut or fruitwoods. Sofa padding is made from foam, down, feathers, fabric or a combination thereof, sofa coverings are usually made out of soft leather, corduroy or linen fabric coverings. The Grove Encyclopedia of Decorative Arts
6.
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres
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Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres was a French Neoclassical painter. A man profoundly respectful of the past, he assumed the role of a guardian of orthodoxy against the ascendant Romantic style represented by his nemesis. His exemplars, he explained, were the great masters which flourished in that century of glorious memory when Raphael set the eternal. I am thus a conservator of good doctrine, and not an innovator, Ingres was born in Montauban, Tarn-et-Garonne, France, the first of seven children of Jean-Marie-Joseph Ingres and his wife Anne Moulet. From his father the young Ingres received early encouragement and instruction in drawing and music, and his first known drawing, the deficiency in his schooling would always remain for him a source of insecurity. In 1791, Joseph Ingres took his son to Toulouse, where the young Jean-Auguste-Dominique was enrolled in the Académie Royale de Peinture, Sculpture et Architecture, there he studied under the sculptor Jean-Pierre Vigan, the landscape painter Jean Briant, and the neoclassical painter Guillaume-Joseph Roques. Roques veneration of Raphael was an influence on the young artist. Ingres won prizes in several disciplines, such as composition, figure and antique and his musical talent was developed under the tutelage of the violinist Lejeune, and from the ages of thirteen to sixteen he played second violin in the Orchestre du Capitole de Toulouse. Ingres followed his masters neoclassical example but revealed, according to David and his trip to Rome, however, was postponed until 1806, when the financially strained government finally appropriated the travel funds. Working in Paris alongside several other students of David in a provided by the state. He found inspiration in the works of Raphael, in Etruscan vase paintings, in 1802 he made his debut at the Salon with Portrait of a Woman. The following year brought a commission, when Ingres was one of five artists selected to paint full-length portraits of Napoleon Bonaparte as First Consul. These were to be distributed to the towns of Liège, Antwerp, Dunkerque, Brussels. In the summer of 1806 Ingres became engaged to Marie-Anne-Julie Forestier, although he had hoped to stay in Paris long enough to witness the opening of that years Salon, in which he was to display several works, he reluctantly left for Italy just days before the opening. Chaussard condemned Ingress style as gothic and asked, How, with so much talent, a line so flawless, the answer is that he wanted to do something singular, something extraordinary. M. Ingress intention is nothing less than to make art regress by four centuries, to carry us back to its infancy, Ingres stylistic eclecticism represented a new tendency in art. As art historian Marjorie Cohn has written, At the time, Artists and critics outdid each other in their attempts to identify, interpret, and exploit what they were just beginning to perceive as historical stylistic developments. From the beginning of his career, Ingres freely borrowed from earlier art, adopting the style appropriate to his subject
7.
Djuna Barnes
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Djuna Barnes was an American writer and artist best known for her novel Nightwood, a cult classic of lesbian fiction and an important work of modernist literature. In 1913, Barnes began her career as a freelance journalist, by early 1914, Barnes was a highly sought feature reporter, interviewer, and illustrator whose work appeared in the city’s leading newspapers and periodicals. In 1921, a commission with McCall’s magazine took Barnes to Paris. During the 1930s, Barnes spent time in England, Paris, New York and it was during this restless time that she wrote and published Nightwood. In October 1939, after two decades living mostly in Europe, Barnes returned to New York. She published her last major work, the verse play The Antiphon, in 1958, Barnes was born in a log cabin on Storm King Mountain, near Cornwall-on-Hudson, New York. Her paternal grandmother Zadel Barnes was a writer, journalist, and her father, Wald Barnes, was an unsuccessful composer, musician, and painter. An advocate of polygamy, he married Barness mother Elizabeth in 1889, his mistress Fanny Clark moved in with them in 1897 and they had eight children, whom Wald made little effort to support financially. As the second oldest child, Barnes spent much of her childhood helping care for siblings and half-siblings and she received her early education at home, mostly from her father and grandmother, who taught her writing, art, and music but neglected subjects such as math and spelling. She claimed to have had no schooling at all, some evidence suggests that she was enrolled in public school for a time after age ten. At the age of 16 she was raped, apparently by a neighbor with the knowledge and consent of her father and she referred to the rape obliquely in her first novel Ryder and more directly in her furious final play The Antiphon. Shortly before her 18th birthday she reluctantly married Fanny Clarks brother Percy Faulkner in a ceremony without benefit of clergy. The match had been promoted by her father, grandmother, mother, and brother. In 1912 Barness family, facing financial ruin, split up, Elizabeth moved to New York City with Barnes and three of her brothers, then filed for divorce, freeing Wald to marry Fanny Clark. Upon arriving at the Daily Eagle, Barnes declared, “I can draw and write and she also published short fiction in the New York Morning Telegraphs Sunday supplement and in the pulp magazine All-Story Cavalier Weekly. Much of Barness journalism was subjective and experiential, writing about a conversation with James Joyce, she admitted to missing part of what he said because her attention had wandered, though she revered Joyces writing. For a 1914 New York World magazine article she submitted to force-feeding and she concluded, I had shared the greatest experience of the bravest of my sex. It was their mistreatment which motivated Barnes to experience for herself the torture of being force-fed, Barnes immersed herself in risky situations in order to access experiences that a previous generation of homebound women had been denied
8.
National Gallery of Canada
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The National Gallery of Canada, located in the capital city of Ottawa, Ontario, is one of Canadas premier art galleries. The Gallery is now housed in a glass and granite building on Sussex Drive with a view of the Canadian Parliament buildings on Parliament Hill. The building was designed by Moshe Safdie and opened in 1988, the Gallerys former director Jean Sutherland Boggs was chosen especially by Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau to oversee construction of the national gallery and museums. Marc Mayer was named the director, succeeding Pierre Théberge. In 1911, the Gallery moved to the Victoria Memorial Museum, in 1913, the first National Gallery Act was passed outlining the Gallerys mandate and resources. In 1962, the Gallery moved to the Lorne Building site, adjacent to the British High Commission, the building has since been demolished for a 17 storey office building that is to house the Federal Finance Department. The museum moved into its current building on Sussex Drive in 1988, in 1985, the newly created Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, formerly the Stills Photography Division of the National Film Board of Canada, was affiliated to the National Gallery. The CMCPs mandate, collection and staff moved to its new location in 1992, at 1 Rideau Canal, in 1998, the CMCPs administration was amalgamated to that of the National Gallerys. In 2000, the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada chose the National Gallery as one of the top 500 buildings produced in Canada during the last millennium, although its focus is on Canadian art, it holds works by many noted American and European artists. It has a contemporary art collection with some of Andy Warhols most famous works. In 1990 the Gallery bought Barnett Newmans Voice of Fire for $1.8 million, since that time its value has appreciated sharply. In 2005, the Gallery acquired a painting by Italian Renaissance painter Francesco Salviati for $4.5 million and its most famous painting is likely The Death of General Wolfe by Anglo-American artist Benjamin West. In 2005, a sculpture of a giant spider, Louise Bourgeoiss Maman, was installed in the plaza in front of the Gallery. The Canadian collection, the most comprehensive in Canada, holds works by Louis-Philippe Hébert, Tom Thomson, the Gallery organizes its own exhibits which travel across Canada and beyond, and hosts shows from around the world, often co-sponsored with other national art galleries and museums. The Gallerys collection has been built up through purchase and donations, much of the collection was donated, notably the British paintings donated by former Governor General Vincent Massey and that of the Southam family. The museum features Canadian, Native and Inuit art, American and European painting, sculpture, prints and drawings, modern and contemporary art and photographs. After the convent was demolished in 1972, the chapel was dismantled, stored and reconstructed within the gallery as a work of art in 1988. Francis Bacon, Study for Portrait No.1 Hans Baldung, Eve, the Serpent and Death Pompeo Batoni, Vulcan at his forge
9.
The Death of Marat
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The Death of Marat is a painting by Jacques-Louis David of the murdered French revolutionary leader Jean-Paul Marat. It is one of the most famous images of the French Revolution, David was the leading French painter, as well as a Montagnard and a member of the revolutionary Committee of General Security. The painting shows the radical journalist lying dead in his bath on 13 July 1793 after his murder by Charlotte Corday. Painted in the months after Marats murder, it has described by T. J. Clark as the first modernist painting, for the way it took the stuff of politics as its material. Marat was one of the leaders of the Montagnards, the radical faction ascendant in French politics during the Reign of Terror until the Thermidorian Reaction, Charlotte Corday was a Girondin from a minor aristocratic family and a political enemy of Marat who blamed him for the September Massacre. She gained entrance to Marats rooms with a note promising details of a ring in Caen. Marat suffered from a condition that caused him to spend much of his time in his bathtub. Corday fatally stabbed Marat, though she did not attempt to flee and she was later tried and executed for the murder. As well as being the leading French painter of his generation, David was a prominent Montagnard, and he was also on the Committee of Public Instruction. For example, the painting contains no sign of his problems, his skin appears clean. David, however, drew other details from his visit to Marats residence the day before the assassination, the rug, the papers. David promised his peers in the National Convention that he would later depict their murdered friend invocatively as écrivant pour le bonheur du peuple, the Death of Marat is designed to commemorate a personable hero. Although the name Charlotte Corday can be seen on the held in Marats left hand. Close inspection of this painting shows Marat at his last breath, therefore, David intended to record more than just the horror of martyrdom. The Death of Marat has often compared to Michelangelos Pietà. Note the elongated arm hanging down in both works, David admired Caravaggios works, especially Entombment of Christ, which mirrors The Death of Marats drama and light. David sought to transfer the sacred qualities long associated with the monarchy and he painted Marat, martyr of the Revolution, in a style reminiscent of a Christian martyr, with the face and body bathed in a soft, glowing light. As Christian art had done from its beginning, David also played with multileveled references to classical art, widely admired during the Terror whose leaders ordered several copies of the original work, The Death of Marat slowly ceased to be frontpage history after Robespierres overthrow and execution
