Neoclassical Art Movement: A Visual Transition of Enlightenment

1. Dr. Schiller: AP History of Art Neoclassical Art The Enlightenment and its Legacy [some of the slides and/or were taken from PowerPoints created by Matt Curliss and William V. Ganis, PhD and/or from Art History by Marilyn Stokstad ]

2. NEOCLASSICAL ART 1750-1815

3. N E O C L A S S I C A L PAINTERS ENGLISH Joseph Wright of Derby William Hogarth Thomas Gainsborough Sir Joshua Reynolds FRENCH Jean Siméon Chardin Élisabeth Louise Vigée-Lebrun Jacques Louis David Jean-Auguste Dominique Ingres AMERICAN John Singleton Copley

4. Factors that sparked theNeoclassical movement: Excavations of Pompeii and Herculaneum in 1738 & Lord Elgin Marbles of 1801 The Age of Enlightenment and its emphasis on Reason Rococo was too frilly and shallow

5. Differences between Baroque/Rococo and Neoclassical Art

6. N E O C L A S S I C A L Difference #1 Emphasized drawing of line (which appealed to the intellect), rather than color (which appeals to the senses)

7. N E O C L A S S I C A L Difference #2 Brushwork was smooth and compositions were simple to avoid Rococo melodrama

8. N E O C L A S S I C A L Difference #3 Neoclassical figures more solid looking than French Classical Baroque

9. SEE THE DIFFERENCE? Baroque: Poussin, The Rape of the Sabine Women, 1640s. Neoclassical: David, The Death of Socrates, 1787.

10. Neoclassical Painting:

11. Gardner plate 28-3 ENGLISH Joseph Wright of Derby, A Philosopher Givinga Lecture at the Orrery , 1763-1765

12. ●Wright specialized in the drama of candlelit and moonlight scene ●Advances in science and technology in the 1700s, which started with the Scientific Revolution in the 1600s, fascinated people ●Here, a scholar uses an orrery (a special mechanical model of the solar system showing planetary movement) to demonstrate theory that universe operates like a giant clockwork mechanism ●the light comes from a candle representing the sun ●everyone in painting is caught up in the wonders of scientific knowledge; an ordinary lecture take son the qualities of a grand “history painting” ●Wright renders everything with careful accuracy of every detail ●His realism appealed to the accuracy industrialists of the day, such such as Josiah Wedgwood

13. Jean Siméon Chardin (French, 1699–1779) Soap Bubbles, ca. 1734, oil on canvas, 24 x 25 in FRENCH

14. The idle play of children was a favorite theme of Chardin's, part of the taste for the “natural” narratives especially if they taught oral lessons, dismissing the frivolities and indecencies of the Rococo In this painting of about 1734, he drew inspiration from the seventeenth-century Dutch genre tradition, for both format and subject. While it is not certain that he intended the picture to carry a message other than the simple goodness of ordinary people, soap bubbles usually allude to the transience of life. Chardin painted two other versions of this picture, including one in LACMA

15. William Hogarth (1697 –1764) a major English painter, printmaker, pictorial satirist, social critic and editorial cartoonist he has been credited with pioneering western sequential art. His work ranged from excellent realistic portraiture to comic strip-like series of pictures called “modern moral subjects”. Much of his work, though at times vicious, poked fun at contemporary politics and customs. Illustrations in such style are often referred to as Hogarthian. English Self-Portrait with Pug-Dog. 1745.

16. William Hogarth, Breakfast Scene from “Marriage a la Mode”, 1745, oil on canvas, ~2/4” x 3’ Gardner plate 28-9

17. the tail end of the arranged marriage of a young noble, after a long night spent in different pursuits • wife stayed home--evening of cards and music making/sleepy and flirtatious • the husband away carousing • in his empty pocket, his wife’s dog sniffs a lacy woman’s cap • a steward holds unpaid bills and rolls his eyes • rich home but filled with witty • clues about bad taste of its • owners--e.g., religious paintings • on wall in far room, but • curtained painting probably • erotic! • This picture is one of 6 that • satirize the immorality the • moneyed English classes • practiced within marriage.

18. William Hogarth, The Marriage Contract from Marriage a la Mode, 1743 Stokstad plate 26-32.

19. William Hogarth, The Suicide Countess from Marriage a la Mode, 1745.

20. William Hogarth, A Rake’s Progress (etching), 1735. *etching: a kind of engraving in which the design is incised in a layer of wax or varnish on a meal plate. The parts of the plate left expose are then etched (slightly eaten away) by the acid in which the plate is immersed after incising

21. Hogarth, A Harlot's Progress, plate 4 of 6

22. Like many of contemporaries, Vigee-Lebrun lived a life of extraordinary personal and economic independence, working for the nobility throughout Europe. She was successful during the age of the late monarchy in France She was one of the few women admitted to the Academy. But after the French Revolution her membership was rescinded, because they no longer allowed women Élisabeth Louise Vigée-LebrunSelf Portrait Uffizi, Florence, 1790 oil on canvas, 8’4” x 6’9” Gardner plate 28-8 French G

23. Although her mood is lighthearted and the costume’s details echo the serpentine curve beloved by Rococo artists and wealthy patrons, nothing about Vigee-Lebrun pose or her mood speaks of Rococo frivolity. Hers is the self-confident stance of a woman whose art has won her an independent role in her society. She was famous for the force and grace of her portraits, especially those of highborn ladies and royalty Here, she painted herself in a close-up, intimate view at work on one of the portraits hat won her fame, that of Queen Marie Antoinette

24. Vigee-LebrunPortrait of Marie Antoinette and Her Children,1787. oil on canvas, ~9’ x ~7 1/2’ Stokstad plate 26-46 FRENCH NEOCLASSICAL

25. Élisabeth Louise Vigée-LebrunSelf Portrait with Daughter 1789

26. Other Female Neoclassical Painters Adélaïde Labille-GuiardSelf-Portrait withTwo Pupils,1785, oil on canvas, 6’9” x 6’ Stokstad plate 26-47 French

27. Other Female Neoclassical Painters Angelic Kauffmann SWISS Angelica Kauffmann, Mother of the Gracchi, 1785 oikl on canvas, 40 x 50” Stokstad plate 26-36. The subject of this piece is an informative exemplum virtutis (example or model of virtue) drawn from Greek and Roman history and literature. The moralizing pictures of Hogarth and Grueze already had marked change in taste, but Kauffmann replaced the modern setting and characters of their works. The actors are clothed in Roman garb and posed in classical Roman attitudes within Roman interiors.

28. The theme is the virtue of Cornelia, mother of the future political leaders Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus, who attempted to reform the Roman republic in the second century B.C. Cornelia’s character is revealed in this scene, which takes place after a lady visitor had shown off her fine jewelry and then haughtily requested that Cornelia show hers. Instead of rushing to get them, Cornelia brings her sons forward, presenting them as her jewels. Angelica Kauffmann, Mother of the Gracchi, 1785.

29. Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788) Thomas Gainsborough was an English painter who is considered one of the great masters of portraiture and landscape.

30. Thomas Gainsborough, The Blue Boy, c. 1770, oil on canvas, ~71” x 49” ENGLISH

31. Perhaps Gainsborough's most famous work, it might be a portrait of Jonathan Buttall, the son of a wealthy hardware merchant, although this was never proved. The portrait now resides in the Huntingdon Library It was often rumored that Gainsborough painted the portrait in response to rival Joshua Reynolds It is a historical costume study as well as a portrait: the youth in his 17th-century apparel is regarded as Gainsborough's homage to Anthony Van Dyck, and in particular is very close to Van Dyck's portrait of Charles II as a boy

32. Thomas Gainsborough,Mrs. Richard Brinsley, 1787 oil on canvas, ~7‘ x5 1/2 ‘ Stokstad plate 26-34

33. Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792) Sir Joshua Reynolds, an English painter in the Grand Manner, who was the foremost portraitist of his day.

34. Sir Joshua Reynolds Sir Joshua Reynolds was the most important and influential of 18th century English painters, specializing in portraits and promoting the "Grand Style" in painting which depended on idealization of the imperfect. ENGLISH Sir Joshua ReynoldsMiss Elizabeth Ingram. 1757.

35. Sir Joshua Reynolds, Portrait of Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse, exhibited 1784

36. Sir Joshua Reynolds The Painter’s Daughters Chasing a Butterfly c1756 ENGLISH NEOCLASSICAL

37. Joshua Reynolds George Augustus Eliott, Lord Heathfield, 1787, oil on canvas, 4’8” x 3’9” Gardner plate 28-11 English Just weeks before he sat for this portrait, General Eliott had been made Lord Heathfield, a reward for his remarkable achievements as governor of Gibraltar. Eliott became a national hero after successfully defending the peninsula against a three-year siege by the Spanish and French. The key signifies both his and his nation's loyalty to its colony. Significantly, the portrait was commissioned by a print publisher who wanted to exploit Lord Heathfield's celebrity through the sale of prints after this painting.

38. Thomas Gainsborough Sir Joshua Reynolds Joshua Reynolds, George Augustus Eliott, Lord Heathfield, 1787, Mrs. Richard Brinsley, 1787. Thomas Gainsborough,Mrs. Richard Brinsley, 1787.

39. John Singleton Copley,Portrait of Paul Revere, 1770, oil on canvas, ~3’ x 2’4” Gardner plate 28-13 American More “Natural” Neoclassical Style

40. This work shows a sense of directness and faithfulness to visual fact that marked the taste for “downrightness” and plainness many visitors to America noticed during the 18th and 19th centuries. The painting doesn’t show him yet as the familiar hero of the American Revolution, but working his everyday profession as a silversmith. Revere is seated in a plain, revealingly lit setting, bent over the teapot in progress yet taking a quick pause to turn his head and look the viewer in the eye. The informality and sense of moment link the painting to contemporaneous English and European portraits, but the spare style and emphasis on the sitter’s down-to-earth style differentiate the American work from British and continental counterparts.

41. John Singleton Copley Samuel Adams, 1772. oil on canvas, 50 x 40 “ Stokstad plate 26-1

42. Benjamin West, The Death of General Wolfe, 1771, oil on canvas, ~5 x 7’ Stokstad plate 26-37 Other American Neoclassical Painters: WEST, AMERICAN The combination of traditional heroic painting with modern realism won viewer’s hearts during that time and influenced many other historical paintings into the nineteenth century. \

43. Other American Neoclassical Painters Gilbert Stuart Portrait of George Washington, 1797. AMERICAN

44. Other American Neoclassical Painters AMERICAN Charles Wilson Peale George Washington ca. 1779-81oil on canvas95 x 61 3/4 in.

45. David was pro-French Revolution and even signed some death orders during the Reign of Terror Later, he admired and painted Napoleon Jacques-Louis DavidSelf-Portrait1794. French

46. Stokstad plate 26-48 Jacques-Louis David, The Oath of the Horatii, 1787, oil on canvas, ~11’ x 14’

47. This painting occupies an extremely important place in the body of David's work and in the history of French painting. It was commissioned by the Administrator of Royal Residences in 1784 and exhibited at the 1785 Salon under the title The Oath of the Horatii, between their Father's Hands. The story was taken from Titus-Livy. We are in the period of the wars between Rome and Alba, in 669 BCE. It has been decided that the dispute between the two cities must be settled by an unusual form of combat to be fought by two groups of three champions each. David succeeded in ennobling these passions and transforming these virtues into something sublime. He chose the idea of the oath (it is not mentioned in the historical accounts), transforming the event into a solemn act that bound the wills of different individuals in a single, creative gesture. The viewer's eye spontaneously grasps two superimposed orders--that of the figures and that of the decor.

48. Through David's rigorous and efficient arrangement, the superior harmony of the colors, and the spiritual density of the figures, this sacrifice, transfigured by the oath, becomes the founding act of a new aesthetic and moral order. He consciously intended it to be a proclamation of the new neoclassical style in which dramatic lighting, ideal forms, and gestural clarity are emphasized. Presenting a lofty moralistic (and by implication patriotic) theme, the work became the principal model for noble and heroic historical painting of the next two decades. It also launched David's personal popularity and awarded him the right to take on his own students.

49. Jacques-Louis David, The Death of Socrates, 1787.

50. This is Marat, one of the head group that sent thousands to the guillotine during the Reign of Terror He was in the bath to relieve the pain and itching of a disgusting skin disease He was stabbed to death by a French woman Clearly, David, an admirer and revolutionary colleague, “cleaned him up” to make this heroic-looking painting. Jacques-Louis David, Death of Marat, 1793, oil on canvas, 5’3” x 4’1” Stokstad plate 26-49