38. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
The Ambassadors of Agamemnon in the tent of Achilles
The Ambassadors of Agamemnon in the tent of Achilles is an 1801 painting by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, produced for the Prix de Rome competition.
It shows an episode from Homer's Iliad, in which Achilles refuses to listen to the envoys sent by Agamemnon to convince him back into the Trojan War.
The topic assigned for the artists competing for the Prix de Rome in 1801 was the warriors' procession toward battle; Ingres' interpretation of the subject characteristically emphasized
a moment of psychological drama instead of physical action.The work was intended as a demonstration of Ingres' mastery of the human figure in classical history painting – Odysseus
is shown in a red cloak derived from a sculpture by Pseudo-Phidias.
The painting is in the neo-classical style and belongs to the school of Jacques-Louis David, in whose studio Ingres had trained.
39. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
Jupiter and Thetis
Ingres brings the words of Homer's Iliad to life in his depiction of Jupiter and Thetis. In this scene of Mount Olympus, Thetis, a mere nymph (a class of lesser deities of mythology, conceived of as
beautiful maidens inhabiting the sea rivers, woods, trees, mountains, meadows) pleads with the mighty God, Jupiter, for the life of her son Achilles. She begs him to intervene by making the Greeks
repent of their injustice to Achilles by granting success to the enemy Trojan army.
Ingres contrasts the two characters beautifully. He displays the corporal qualities he sees fitting for each gender; Jupiter possesses a hard muscular body to Thetis' sensuous, voluptuous curves. Their
body language is also in sharp defiance; he sits firm and erect like a statue, she contorts her body like a snake. Emotion pours over her face, exuding from each limb. Jupiter looks straight ahead with
no readable emotion on his face. He displays an evasive pose, with both his arms and legs spread broadly across the canvas. Thetis makes as much contact with his body as possible while he
makes no effort to touch her.
True to Ingres style, he adds both obvious and subtle elements of eroticism. Each point of contact her skin makes to the god's is poignant. Her left hand fondles his beard while her right lays across his
lap suggesting an erotic caress. She rests her breasts on his thigh and her toe lightly caresses his. Her attempts to appear modest are shrugged away as her clothes fall off her slithering body. All the
while Juno, Jupiter's wife, peers in from the left to see what's going on.
Out of all the work Ingres created during his 87 years, he considered Jupiter and Thetis his ultimate masterpiece. Ingres displayed two of his favorite subjects, history and the female nude, through a
brilliant and direct composition. His use of colors plays a part in contrasting the emotions of both of Homer's characters of the Iliad.
Jupiter's broad, confident body takes up nearly the entire canvas for a reason. His stature, poised yet relaxed, shows the weight of his importance in this scene. It is solely his decision whether or not
Achilles lives or dies. The slithering Thetis seems small and insignificant in comparison to the deity.
The emotion portrayed by the pleading mother, Thetis, cannot be overlooked. She makes a desperate attempt to save her son Achille's life, employing erotic and sensual gestures to have her request
granted. She looks straight up at the unyielding god with the passion only a beggar's eyes can contain. Her lips are tight with anticipation of the answer, almost as if she prepares for the thanks which
will spill from her lips if he greants her plea. Her body is draped over him.
Jupiter on the other hand sits confidently, seemly unmoved by her supplications. He stares ahead almost as if he barely notices her touches, let alone her presence.
40. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
The Apotheosis of Homer
Ingres attempted in 1827 a historical synopsis in his great composition, the Apotheosis of Homer. This canvas was originally a ceiling decoration in the Salle Clarac in the
Louvre.
The most famous artists in history are depicted here: Dante and Molière and painters such as Poussin, but Homer reigns above them all. This assembly of great artists and
writers of all ages gathered to honour the ancient Greek poet before a classical temple might look the epitome of hierarchical academicism.
The painting was intended as the sum of all aesthetic rules. However, it could hardly live up to the expectations. Today it seems stiff and unnatural.
The painting's formal composition and pale, sugary colours appear at the opposite extreme to Delacroix's Sardanapalus, shown in the same Salon. Delacroix's picture seems far
away from academic orthodoxy, while Ingres's Homer looks like its ultimate endorsement.
41. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
Don Pedro of Toledo Kissing the Sword of Henri IV
1820
Painting in the Troubador style, showing the Spanish ambassador Pedro Álvarez de Toledo, 5th Marquis of Villafranca kissing the sword of Henry IV
of France (held by a young page) in the salle des Caryatides of the Louvre palace.
The artist painted four versions of the subject between 1814 and 1832:
1814 - exhibited at the Paris Salon that year but now lost.
1819 - now at the château de Pau, very close to the original, displayed in the 2014 L'invention du Passé.
1820 - previously in a private collection in Oslo,recently acquired for the Louvre Abu Dhabi.
1831 - now in the Louvre Museum, which it entered in 1981.
42. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
The Sword of Henri IV
1818
Oil on canva
Musee National du Chateau de Pau, France
INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
The Sword of Henri IV
1831
Oil on canvas
Musée du Louvre, Paris
43. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
The Virgin Adoring the Host
This small, jewel-like devotional painting was made as a gift for Ingres’s friend Louise Marcotte, who introduced the artist to Delphine Ramel, whom he married in 1852. The
Raphaelesque composition is based on one Ingres first painted in 1841 for the future czar Alexander II, which includes the two patron saints of Russia, Alexander Nevsky and
Nicholas (Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow).
For this version, Ingres replaced the Russian saints with two French ones. He would go on to paint four more variants, as well as, in 1855, a watercolor for Madame Ingres
herself (Fogg Museum, Cambridge, Mass.).
44. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
Odalisque with Slave
1839
Odalisque with Slave (French: L'Odalisque à l'esclave) is an 1839 painting by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres commissioned by Charles Marcotte. Executed in oil on canvas, it
depicts a nude odalisque, a musician, and a eunuch in a harem interior. The painting is in the Fogg Art Museum in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is a classic piece of Orientalism in
French painting.
As Ingres never visited the Near East, Odalisque with Slave depicts an imaginary scene.[1] It was composed in Rome, where the artist lived from 1835 to 1841 while serving as
director of the French Academy there.[2] The odalisque was painted from a life drawing Ingres had made years earlier.[3] The musician was painted from a model posed in the
studio, and many details such as the tanbour were derived from engravings.
Ingres made a second version in 1842 with the help of two of his students, Paul and Jean-Hippolyte Flandrin, which is at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore. In this version the
background wall, described by art historian Karin Grimme as imprisoning the odalisque in "a room with no exit", was replaced with a garden painted by Paul Flandrin, inspired by
the park at the Château de Dampierre.
45. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
FLANDRIN, Paul
FLANDRIN, Jean-Hippolyte
Odalisque with Slave
1842
This painting was commissioned by King Wilhelm I of Württemberg and was executed by Ingres with the assistance of his pupil Paul Flandrin. A version of this subject
painted three years earlier shows the odalisque in an enclosed room rather than with the garden vista in the background (Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts).
This exotic composition, which was inspired by a passage from Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's Turkish Letters (1763), may have been conceived by Ingres in response to
his rival Eugène Delacroix's success as a painter of Near Eastern subjects.
46. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
Paolo and Francesca
Paolo and Francesca is painting by the French artist Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, produced in seven known between 1814 and 1819. It derives from the story of
Paolo and Francesca in Dante's Inferno. With Ingres' The Engagement of Raphael, these works represent one of the first examples of the troubador style.
Of the seven known versions, that in the Musée des beaux-arts d'Angers is considered the most complete, notably in the exaggerated form of Paolo, whose neck recalls
the same artist's Jupiter and Thetis. The frontality of the composition and the details of the room and clothes refer back to the Northern Renaissance.
47. INGRES, Jean-Auguste-Dominique
Jean Ingres was a French neoclassical painter, who considered himself the protector of French academic orthodoxy,
and fought against the rising popularity of Romanticism. He also considered the leader of the Romantic movement,
Eugene Delacroix, his artistic nemesis.
At age 11, the French Revolution began, disrupting his traditional childhood, which became a constant source of
insecurity. As a budding artist, Ingres was able to observe the many examples of famous artworks of Belgium, Holland,
and Spain, which had been looted during the exploits of Napoleon, and were held at the Louvre.
He freely borrowed from their classical interpretations and used the techniques in his own art, leading to many critics to
accuse him of plundering the past. It was in this vein that his first submissions to the Paris Salon were received very
poorly. Ingres’ humiliation was so deep that he vowed never to return to Paris.
Throughout his early art career, his painting style, which emphasized the purity of color and did not employ the gradual
shifting of color and shading as in Romantic paintings, led to many bad reviews. Ironically, it was only the Romantic
artists, whom he so hated, that recognized and appreciated Ingres’s talents.
At the end of the Napoleonic empire, Ingres found himself without patronage and penniless. He survived by illustrating
drawings for English tourists, many of which rank among his best creations. In 1824, he exhibited his Vow of Louis XIII,
which led to his critical acclaim and made him widely popular. Even his earlier works, which had led to his humiliation
and disgrace, were held up as masterpieces, and widely distributed.