The Paris Sketch Book of Mr. M. A. TitmarshThackeray, William Makepeace
General
The Paris Sketch Book of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh
Thackeray, William Makepeace
Paris (France) -- Description and travel
The picture, by Court, of “The Death of Cæsar,” is remarkable for
effect and excellent workmanship: and the head of Brutus (who looks
like Armand Carrel) is full of energy. There are some beautiful heads
of women, and some very good color in the picture. Jacquand’s “Death of
Adelaide de Comminges” is neither more nor less than beautiful.
Adelaide had, it appears, a lover, who betook himself to a convent of
Trappists. She followed him thither, disguised as a man, took the vows,
and was not discovered by him till on her death-bed. The painter has
told this story in a most pleasing and affecting manner: the picture is
full of onction and melancholy grace. The objects, too, are capitally
represented; and the tone and color very good. Decaisne’s “Guardian
Angel” is not so good in color, but is equally beautiful in expression
and grace. A little child and a nurse are asleep: an angel watches the
infant. You see women look very wistfully at this sweet picture; and
what triumph would a painter have more?
We must not quit the Luxembourg without noticing the dashing sea-pieces
of Gudin, and one or two landscapes by Giroux (the plain of
Grasivaudan), and “The Prometheus” of Aligny. This is an imitation,
perhaps; as is a noble picture of “Jesus Christ and the Children,” by
Flandrin: but the artists are imitating better models, at any rate; and
one begins to perceive that the odious classical dynasty is no more.
Poussin’s magnificent “Polyphemus” (I only know a print of that
marvellous composition) has, perhaps, suggested the first-named
picture; and the latter has been inspired by a good enthusiastic study
of the Roman schools.
Of this revolution, Monsieur Ingres has been one of the chief
instruments. He was, before Horace Vernet, president of the French
Academy at Rome, and is famous as a chief of a school. When he broke up
his atelier here, to set out for his presidency, many of his pupils
attended him faithfully some way on his journey; and some, with
scarcely a penny in their pouches, walked through France and across the
Alps, in a pious pilgrimage to Rome, being determined not to forsake
their old master. Such an action was worthy of them, and of the high
rank which their profession holds in France, where the honors to be
acquired by art are only inferior to those which are gained in war. One
reads of such peregrinations in old days, when the scholars of some
great Italian painter followed him from Venice to Rome, or from
Florence to Ferrara. In regard of Ingres’s individual merit as a
painter, the writer of this is not a fair judge, having seen but three
pictures by him; one being a plafond in the Louvre, which his disciples
much admire.
Ingres stands between the Imperio-Davido-classical school of French
art, and the namby-pamby mystical German school, which is for carrying
us back to Cranach and Dürer, and which is making progress here.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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