Géricault in a fit of disappointment entered the army and served for a time in the garrison of Versailles. He exhibited Wounded Cuirassier at the Salon in 1814, a work more labored and less well received. This youthful success, ambitious and monumental, was followed by a change in direction: for the next several years Géricault produced a series of small studies of horses and cavalrymen. Géricault's first major work, The Charging Chasseur, exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1812, revealed the influence of the style of Rubens and an interest in the depiction of contemporary subject matter. Much of his time was spent in Versailles, where he found the stables of the palace open to him, and where he gained his knowledge of the anatomy and action of horses. Géricault soon left the classroom, choosing to study at the Louvre, where from 1810 to 1815 he copied paintings by Rubens, Titian, Velázquez and Rembrandt.ĭuring this period at the Louvre he discovered a vitality he found lacking in the prevailing school of Neoclassicism. Although he died young, he was one of the pioneers of the Romantic movement.īorn in Rouen, France, Géricault was educated in the tradition of English sporting art by Carle Vernet and classical figure composition by Pierre-Narcisse Guérin, a rigorous classicist who disapproved of his student's impulsive temperament while recognizing his talent. She teaches specialist English and Art History at Universities Paris 3 and Paris 4.Jean-Louis André Théodore Géricault was a French painter and lithographer, whose best-known painting is The Raft of the Medusa. Her writing has been published in Apollo Magazine, the Times Literary Supplement, Conde Nast Traveler and WSJ Magazine. She holds an undergraduate degree in French and Art History with a specialty in 19th-century art and literature, and pursued graduate studies in Art History at Paris 4 La Sorbonne, writing a thesis on popular imagery and caricature in Revolutionary and Napoleonic Paris. native, is an adoptive Parisienne and has been wandering Paris' narrow streets and leafy boulevards since 2003. Looking beyond the writhing figures and dismembered body parts of Gericault’s monumental canvas to the political and historical context, we will also shed light on the painting as a comment on Restoration politics in France, and a document in the abolitionist debate of the early 19th century.Ĭaroline Rossiter, a U.K. In this talk we will explore how the painting elevated a heart-stopping, real-life contemporary tragedy to a subject worthy of the History Painting genre, ushering in a new Romantic aesthetic which focused on extremes of emotion. The grisly tale of shipwreck, survival and cannibalism has been told and retold, but what do you know about this painting that made it so controversial to its 19th century audience? The Raft of the Medusa by Theodore Géricault is one of the most famous paintings in the Louvre.
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