Fine Canvas Art Blog

Sappho by Charles August Mengin of 1877

Academician / French / Greco-Roman / Neoclassical / Paintings (Reproductions) - 1 year ago - troycapc

A reproduction of a work by Charles August Mengin, “Sappho”. This Academic masterpiece of 1877 is a wonderful depiction of the greatest poetess of the Classical Age.  Charles August Mengin learned from Gecker and Cabanel and began exhibiting at the Paris Salon the year before producing this, his most famous work.  He died on April 3, 1933 at the age of eighty years.  In this work, Sappho’s sensual and exotic nature is beautifully rendered.  The original is in the Manchester Art Gallery in Manchester, England.

Click here for more information

Cleopatra Before Caesar by Jean-Leon Gerome, 1866

Gerome / Paintings (Reproductions) - 2 years ago - troycapc

Cleopatra Before Caesar is one of Gerome’s most famous masterpieces.   In it, he portrayed the persecuted eighteen year old queen of Egypt, Cleopatra VII, suddenly emerging from a rolled carpet brought into the general’s presence by her slave. Julius Caesar had landed in Egypt on October 2, 48 BCE while Cleopatra was attempting to regain her throne from her younger brother, Ptolemy, who had previously ousted her.

Apparently Caesar was charmed by the gesture, as the following morning Ptolemy arrived to find Caesar and Cleopatra greeting him together.  He was arrested, and soon Caesar and Cleopatra were engaged with Ptolemy’s adherents in the Alexandrian War.  This was yet another struggle in the series of wars that culminated in the end of the Roman Republic 18 years later.

About the Artist:

Born in eastern France in 1824, Jean-Leon Gerome is considered one of the masters of the Academic style of painting, and is renown for his refined treatment of classical subjects: Diogenes, the Death of Caesar, and Pollice Verso among them.  He maintained a prodigious output and became widely recognized as a major artistic figure in France, Germany and Britain.

The Academic Style:

Taking its example from the Renaissance Florentine Academy of the Medicis and the Accademia di San Luca in Rome, the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture was founded in 1648.  Its purpose was to distinguish artists from artisans and later became the Academie des Beaux-arts, spread the Academic ideal across Europe, and eventually inspired the founding of the Royal Academy in Britain and the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, among others.

These academies later molded and developed a style of painting which aimed at a synthesis of the earlier Neoclassicist and Romanticist traditions.  Prior to their creation, French artists in the later Seventeenth century became embroiled in an argument as to whether Rubens or Poussin was the preferred master.  The adherents of Rubens eventually became known as Romanticists and emphasized the use of color in an appeal to nature and the emotions. The followers of Poussin preferred to concentrate their painting on lines and forms and became known later as Neoclassicists.  The debate continued in the Nineteenth century over the Neoclassicism of Ingres versus the Romanticism of Delacroix.  The Academies, desiring order and unity within the community of artists, fostered their own style which attempted to unite these conflicting movements.

PYTRV3VGB9FD

Pollice Verso by Jean-Leon Gerome, 1872

Gerome / Paintings (Reproductions) - 2 years ago - troycapc

In our reproduction of this masterpiece by Jean-Leon Gerome, we’re introduced to the reason why the Latin phrase that serves as the title for the work, Pollice Verso, is today interpreted to mean “thumbs down.”  The literal translation is simply “turned thumb,” and we are in fact uncertain as to how this was actually expressed in the Roman arena.

“Turned” could mean turned up, turned down, turned sideways, turned into the hand, turned towards the body or turned towards the pair of gladiators in the arena, etc.  Also, contrary to some popular notions, the hand gesture was never documented to have been used as a verdict towards prisoners or Christian martyrs in the arena.

It is a tribute to Gerome and this painting that Gerome’s interpretation has spread throughout modern culture.  According to Director Ridley Scott, the painting was a major influence in the production of the motion picture Gladiator.

In this image the victorious gladiator is turning towards the Vestal Virgins in their honored place in the Coliseum.  That situates the scene within the City of Rome after 72 CE, the date of the completion of the Coliseum.  The limiting date for this scene would have be approximately 400 CE, for it is then that the gladiatorial games and the sacred order of the Vestal Virgins both came to an end.  Interestingly, modern scholarship has shown that the gladiatorial equipment portrayed in this painting is not altogether authentic.

Jean-Leon Gerome was an adherent of the “Academic” style of painting.  The Academic school was a synthesis of the earlier Neoclassicist and Romanticist traditions as influenced and molded by the European academies and universities, notably the Académie des Beaux-Arts.

In the later 17th century, controversy arose as to whether line or color was more important in painting due to their respective appeals to the intellect versus the emotions.  The debate was revived in the 19th century with Neoclassicists championing a linear approach versus Romanticists, who favored color.  The various European academies attempted to unite the two sides of the argument and the result was new style which honored both line and style and tended to look to the art of the past for models, scenes, and inspiration.

This 1872 artwork by Jean-Leon Gerome was one of the Frenchman’s most successful efforts to master the Academic style of painting.  Gerome arrived in Paris in 1840, an impressionable sixteen year-old.  Within three years he accompanied his teacher Paul Delaroche to Florence, Rome, and Pompeii and when he returned to Paris he entered the Ecole des Beaux-Arts but failed in his attempt to enter the Prix de Rome.

In attempting to improve his abilities he created his masterpiece, The Cockfight, in 1846 and it won a third-class medal in the Salon of 1847.  This recognition began his rapid ascension.  Gerome’s paintings began to garner more and more praise and attention, and in 1848 he won a second-class medal and received a commission from the court of Napoleon III…which resulted in his monumental “Age of Augustus” of 1852.

Starting in 1859, Gerome began to concentrate more on themes from the Classical tradition.  These include his Diogenes of 1860, Cleopatra Before Caesar of 1866, Death of Caesar of 1867, and culminated in Pollice Verso in 1872.  In the meantime, Gerome was elected as a member of the prestigious Insitut de France, made a knight of the Legion d’Honneur, established as an honorary member of the British Royal Academy, and inducted into the Prussian Grand Order of the Red Eagle.  With his resulting international recognition and financial success, Gerome bought a home and expanded it into a grand house with atelier and sculpture studio.  He died in his atelier in 1904, in front of a painting of Rembrandt.

The original painting was purchased by Alexander Turney Stewart who displayed it in New York City. Since then it has been acquired by the Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, Arizona, and we are proud to add this fine art print to our collection…as you may be to add it to yours.