Jacques-Louis David

Toperfect Art supplies biography and painting knowledge, this is useful for painters and art fans.

Our art gallery not only supply high-quality Jacques-Louis David oil painting reproduction for sale, but also sell French revolution oil paintings classic.

The famous artists in our art company are good at on canvas paintings reproductions and other beautiful painting wholesale in museum quality such as The Raft of the Medusa, Death of Marat, The Oath of the Horatii, Napoleon Crossing the Alps.

Jacques-Louis David Paintings

Jacques-Louis David Paintings for Sale

Oil Painting Supplies of 350 Famous Painters * Oil Painting Supplies of 150 Styles

Knowledge: Oil Painting * Acrylic Painting * Watercolor Painting * Gouache Painting * Asian Ink Art
Pastel Painting * Charcoal Drawing * Pencil Sketch * Wax Crayon Painting

Toperfect supply oil painting masterpiece reproductions of the old master Jacques-Louis David, you are welcome to send us your own pictures to copy as museum quality oil painting on canvas.

The copyright of scripts in this website is owned by Toperfect. Toperfect reserves the manual scripts of original version. Toperfect will take appropriate legal action in the piracy and infringements of copyright.

Biography of Jacques-Louis David

French Neoclassical painter and draftsman
born 30 April 1748 - died 29 December 1825
Born in: Paris (Département de Ville de Paris, Ile-de-France, France).
Died in: Brussels (Bruxelles, Belgium)
Student of: Francois Boucher (1703-1770), Joseph-Marie Vien (1716-1809)
Masterpieces: The Raft of the Medusa, Death of Marat, The Oath of the Horatii, Napoleon Crossing the Alps.

Teacher of: Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres (1780-1867),
Distant relation of: Francois Boucher (1703-1770).
Patronized by: Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821).

DAVID, JACQUES LOUIS (1748-1825), French painter, was born in Paris on the 30th of April 1748. His father was killed in a duel, when the boy was but nine years old. His education was begun at the College des Quatre Nations, where he obtained a smattering of the classics; but, his artistic talent being already obvious, Jacques-louis David was soon placed by his guardian in the studio of François Boucher. Boucher speedily realized that his own erotic style did not suit the lad's genius, and recommended him to J. M. Vien, the pioneer of the classical reaction in painting. Under him Jacques-Louis David studied for some years, and, after several attempts to win the Prix de Rome, at last succeeded in 1775, with his Loves of Antiochus and Stratonice. Vien, who had just been appointed director of the French Academy at Rome, carried the youth with him to that city. The classical reaction was now in full tide; Winckelmann was writing, Raphael Mengs painting; and the treasures of the Vatican galleries helped to confirm David in a taste already moulded by so many kindred influences. This severely classical spirit inspired first important Jacques-Louis David painting, Date obolum Belisario, exhibited at Paris in 1780. The artwork exactly suited the temper of the times, and was an immense success. It was followed by others, painted on the same principles, but with greater perfection of art: The Grief of Andromache (1783), The Oath of Horatii (Salon, 1785), The Death of Socrates, Love of Paris and Helen (1788), Brutus (1789), The Raft of the Medusa, David Marat, Napoleon Alps.

In the French drama an unimaginative imitation of ancient models had long prevailed; even in Jacques-Louis David art Poussin and Le Sueur were successful by expressing a bias in the same direction; and in the first years of the revolutionary movement the fashion of imitating the ancients even in dress and manners went to the most extravagant length. At this very time David returned to Paris; Jacques-Louis David was now painter to the king, Louis XVI, who had been the purchaser of principal his paintings such as The Raft of the Medusa, Death of Marat, The Oath of the Horatii, Napoleon Crossing the Alps, and his popularity was soon immense. At the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789, Jacques-louis David was carried away by the flood of enthusiasm that made all the intellect of France believe in a new era of equality and emancipation from all the ills of life.

The success of his sketch for Jacques-Louis David art the Oath of the Tennis Court, and his pronounced republicanism, secured his election to the Convention in September 1792, by the Section du Museum, and the artist quickly distinguished himself by the defense of two French artists in Rome who had fallen into the merciless hands of the Inquisition. As, in this matter, the behavior of the authorities of the French Academy in Rome had been dictated by the tradition of subservience to authority, be used his influence to get it suppressed. In the January following his election into the Convention his vote was given for the king's death.

It is difficult for a generation which has witnessed another complete French revolution in the standards of artistic taste to realize the secret of his immense popularity in his own day. His style is severely academic in works The Raft of the Medusa, Death of Marat, David Horatii, Napoleon Crossing the Alps, his color lacking in richness and warmth, his execution hard and uninteresting in its very perfection. Subjects and treatment alike are inspired by the passing fashion of an age which had deceived itself into believing that it was living and moving in the spirit of classical antiquity.

The inevitable reaction of the romantic movement made the masterpieces, which had filled the men of the French Revolution with enthusiasm, seem cold and lifeless to those who had been taught to expect in art that atmosphere of mystery which in nature is everywhere present. Yet Jacques-louis David was a great artist, and exercised in his day and generation a great influence. His paintings are magnificent in their composition, such as The Raft of the Medusa, David Death of Marat, The Oath of the Horatii, Napoleon Crossing the Alps. , and their draughtsman ship; and his keen observation and insight into character are evident, especially in Jacques louise David portraits, notably of Madame Recamier, of the Conventional Gerard and of Boissy d'Anglas.