The very large Paris Salon of 1883 introduced the public and critics to a new and growing movement in painting. It wasn’t Impressionism or Post-Impressionism, though.
Gérôme
Stories of the lives of Alexander, Julius Caesar, Phocion, and Cato the Younger, with superb paintings by Gérôme, Poussin, and others. And some lessons for today.
Was painting ‘invented’ by the maid of Corinth? What is ‘shadow play’, and how have painters extended it to religious works? A short history of shadows in painting.
Made dictator for life, Caesar quickly became unpopular to the point where his life was under threat. Paintings by Rubens, von Piloty, and of course Gérôme.
From his early successes in Spain, Caesar had his heart set on high office. He worked hard for nearly ten years in his campaigns in Gaul, and even landed on the shores of Britain.
The story of a Renaissance city-state on Sardinia, a good mother, and the state funeral of a great Greek general on Sicily – some of the paintings shown.
Some religious stories which may have had personal relevance, and conclusions to his series of Roman spectacles, and his sculpture. Finally, a joke which may have inspired the Surrealists.
Rembrandt’s masterpiece looking deep into Bathsheba’s predicament, but it was von Stuck who first suggested that she may have been a willing participant.
His late career tackled his dislike of Impressionism, sculpture, photography as an art, and the depiction of truth – in several superb paintings.
He solves the problem of how to paint a stock market crash, and looks at what is seen, visual revelation, and truth.
