Jean-Louis-André-Théodore Géricault is now identified as a pioneer of Romanticism in French painting. He loved horses, and dramatic images of rearing horses feature in his work. He was born at Rouen, and from 1808 trained in Paris with Carle Vernet. But after two years he left Vernet - saying 'One of my horses would have devoured six of his' - to go to the Neo-classican painter Pierre Guérin, with whom his friend Delacroix later studied.
Géricault was influenced by the military subjects of Baron Gros and by works in the Louvre, notably those by Rubens and Renaissance Venetian painters. A visit to Italy in 1816-7 intensified Géricault's appreciation of Michelangelo. On his return to Paris he painted his most famous work, 'The Raft of the Medusa' (Paris, The Louvre), a scene of modern drama on a vast scale and executed in the heroic manner, which he exhibited at the Salon of 1819.
An admirer of English art, like Delacroix, he visited England in 1820-1, returning in a state of poor health. From his last years date an exceptional series of portraits, commissioned by a friend, of the inmates of a lunatic asylum.
For earlier works see part 1 also. This is part 2 of a 7-part series on the works of Théodore Géricault:
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| c1814-15 Classical Statuary graphite, pen and brown ink, and brown wash 21.3 x 28.4 cm The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles |
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| c1814-15 Classical Nudes (verso of the above) graphite, pen and brown ink, and brown wash 21.3 x 28.4 cm The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles |
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| 1814-18 Wounded soldiers in a cart oil on paper laid down on canvas 33.2 x 31 cm The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, UK |
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| c1815-20 Trumpeter of the Hussars oil on canvas 72 x 58 cm Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA |
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| 1816 Satyr and Nymph carved from rock 29 x 36 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| c1816-17 Leda and the Swan watercolour, brown wash, white highlights, black pencil, on brown paper 21 x 28 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| 1816-17 A Warrior holding a shield and sword pen and brown ink, brush and brown wash, watercolour, and white gouache over graphite and traces of red chalk 21.6 x 28.6 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| c1816-17 Leda and the Swan (verso of the above) watercolour, brown wash, white highlights, black pencil, on brown paper 21 x 28 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| 1816-17 The Entombment black chalk, grey and black wash, and white gouache on brown wove paper 16.2 x 22.2 cm Harvard Art Museums / Fogg Museums, Cambridge, MA |
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| 1816-17 Seated Italian Peasant watercolour, with black crayon and traces of pink gouache over black chalk, on cream wove paper 25.8 x 21.3 cm Art Institute of Chicago, IL |
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| 1816-17 Satyr and nymph entwined brown wash, white highlights, black pencil 13.5 x 21.3 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| 1816-17 Saint George and the Dragon graphite pencil on paper 26.2 x 21,3 cm Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA |
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| 1816-17 Roman Herdsmen black chalk, brown wash and white gouache on brown wove paper 20.9 x 28.1 cm Harvard Art Museums / Fogg Museums, Cambridge, MA |
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| c1816 Nude Warrior with a Spear oil on canvas 93.6 x 75.5 cm National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC |
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| 1817 The Race of the Riderless Horses oil and pen and ink on paper laid on canvas 19.8 x 29.1 cm The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles |
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| 1817 Naked man defeating an Ox pen and brown ink on paper 24.2 x 30.2 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| 1817 Butchers of Rome lithograph 17.3 x 24.5 cm (plate) Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| 1817 Ancient sacrifice brown wash, white highlights, on oiled paper 28.5 x 42.2 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| c1817-18 Transport of Fualdès' body lead pencil on paper 21 x 27.5 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| c1817-18 The Rescue of a Drowned Man pen and brown ink on paper 24.4 x 30.2 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
c1817-18 The Kidnapping of Fualdès: This drawing, which was believed to be lost, illustrates a news item that caused a great stir at the time: Fualdès, a magistrate under the Empire, was arrested during the night, then assassinated and thrown into the Aveyron. While the judges at this trial concluded that it was a heinous crime, today it is more likely that it was a political conspiracy by the ultras. The artist produced a series of 6 or 7 drawings on this affair, probably with a view to a series of lithographs or to prepare a historical painting. He had given these drawings to his friend Prud'hon, some of which reappeared in 1948, at the sale of the Duke of Trévise's collection.
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| c1817-18 The Kidnapping of Fualdès Pen and brown ink, over pencil lines 20.9 x 26.6 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| c1817-20 Three Lovers oil on canvas 22.5 x 29.8 cm The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles |
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| c1817 Figure Study (Death of Hector?) brown ink over graphite on heavy tan wove paper 28.7 x 23.9 cm Harvard Art Museums / Fogg Museums, Cambridge, MA |
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| c1817 Drummer Boy Attacked by a Cossack brush and brown wash, heightened with white over black chalk on brown wove paper 21.8 x 18 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| 1818 I Dream of Her in the Crashing Waves lithograph 34.2 x 27.8 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
1818 Evening; Landscape with an Aqueduct:
This work is one of a projected set of four monumental landscapes representing the times of day that Gericault painted in his Paris studio. (Only three were completed.) Conceived as a decorative ensemble, the paintings fuse souvenirs of ruins in the Italian countryside, which the artist had visited in 1816 and 1817, with the grand manner exemplified by past masters Nicolas Poussin and Joseph Vernet. The stormy sky and turbulent mood of this picture exemplify notions of the Sublime and the aesthetic of the emerging Romantic movement.
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| 1818 Evening: Landscape with an Aqueduct oil on canvas 250.2 x 219.7 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| 1818 Cart Loaded with Wounded Soldiers lithograph 37 x 52.3 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| 1818 Caisson d’artillerie graphite on ivory wove paper 22.1 x 28.5 cm Art Institute of Chicago, IL |
1818 Boxers: This image represents the popular English sport of boxing: two muscular combatants, in strikingly similar poses, confront one another. The black-and-white medium is used here to accentuate racial difference through stylised symmetries. In a dynamic and dramatic image, Gericault presents rivalry as a conflict between two male "opposites," with a highly charged space between them.
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| 1818 Boxers lithograph 38.5 x 45 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| 1815-16 Landscape with Fishermen graphite, pen and brown ink, blue and brown wash over black chalk on white laid paper 23.2 x 20.7 cm |
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| 1818 Landscape with Fishermen graphite, pen and brown ink, brown and blue wash 22.25 x 20.45 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
1818 The Return from Russia: This print centres on two wounded soldiers as they return from the disastrous French invasion of Russia. In 1812 the French army, led by Napoleon, fought its way into Russian territory, beginning a bloody campaign that lasted five months and ended in a decisive loss for the French that decimated the size of the force as well as public faith in the French military.
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| 1818 Retreat from Russial Lithograph (size not given) National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC |
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| 1818 Portrait of Auguste Brunet lithograph on cream wove paper 17.4 × 14.8 cm (image) Harvard Art Museums / Fogg Museums, Cambridge, MA |
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| 1818 Laden with Wounded Soldiers lithograph in black on cream wove paper 29 x 29.5 cm (image) |
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| 1818 Mamluk Defending a Wounded Trumpeter lithograph 34.2 x 27.8 cm (plate) Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| 1818 Lion Devouring a Horse lithograph 19 x 30 cm (image) Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| 1818 The Prince Viceroy saving an Officer taken Prisoner by the Cossacks black stone, Indian ink, gouache on bistre paper 18.9 x 27 cm Louvre, Paris |
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| 1818 The Boxers lithograph on wove paper 35.3 x 41.8 cm (image) National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC |
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| 1818 The Artillery Caisson lithograph 41.5 x 52.4 cm |
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| c1818 The Rescue of the Survivors of the Raft of the Medusa pen and brown ink, over traces of graphite, on tan wove paper 22.5 x 30.1 cm Art Institute of Chicago, IL |
