ART HISTORY

Journey Through a Thousand Years

“O Dread and Silent Mount!”

Week Ten: Romanticism

Into the World of Mystery – “The Sleep of Reason” – “Monk by the Sea” –

John Nash, The Brighton Pavilion - Francois Rude’s “La Marseillaise” and

the “Arc of Triumph” – A Beginner’s Guide to the Pre-Raphaelites –

“Apotheosis of Homer” – “Rain, Steam & Speed”

Francesco Hayez, Crusaders Thirsting near Jerusalem

Brett & Kate McKay: “Into the World of Mystery” From “The Basics of Art – The Romantic Period” Time Period: 1800-1860

Background: The Industrial Revolution got into swing in the latter part of the

18th century, starting in England and spreading to France and America. This revolution

brought with it a new market economy, based on new technology—machine tools and

machine power instead of human tools and animal power. Villages exploded into urban

centers and people moved to them from farms and the countryside to take jobs in newly

opened factories. With little to no regulations in place, these jobs could be brutal. Men,

women, and children worked 14 hour shifts; where they had once told time by the sun, now

they could go weeks without seeing the light of day. Rapid growth produced cities that were

dirty and crowded, the working poor often lived in squalor, and smokestacks darkened the

air with soot.

While industrialization made consumer goods cheaper and increased the production

of food, there were those who looked back on the past longingly, seeing it as a romantic

period before people were commodified and nature blighted and destroyed.

At the same time, there was a growing reaction against the philosophy of the

Enlightenment, which emphasized science, empirical evidence, and rational thought above

all. Romantics challenged the idea that reason was the one path to truth, judging it

inadequate in understanding the great mysteries of life. These mysteries could be uncovered

with emotion, imagination, and intuition. Nature was especially celebrated as a classroom for

self-discovery and spiritual learning, the place in which mysteries could be revealed to the

mind of man. Romantics emphasized a life filled with deep feeling, spirituality, and free

expression, seeing such virtues as a bulwark against the dehumanizing effects of

industrialization. They also extolled the value of human beings, which they believed to have

infinite, godlike potential.

Artists of the Romantic Period tried to capture these ideals in their work. They

rejected the rationalism and rules-driven orderliness that characterized the Neoclassical style

of the Enlightenment. Like Baroque artists, Romantic artists hoped to inspire an emotional

response in those who viewed their art; but instead of seeking to inspire faith as their

predecessors had, most sought to evoke a nostalgic yearning for rural, pastoral life, the

stirrings of life’s mysteries, and a sense of the power and grandeur of nature. Art of this

period also depicted the romantic ideal of nationalism, but for reasons of length, we will

focus on landscapes in this post.

Examples of Romantic Art:

“The Chancel and Crossing of Tintern Abbey, Looking Towards the East Window,” by JMW Turner,

1794. Tintern Abbey was a monastery founded in 1131 and rebuilt in the 13th century.

Abandoned in 1536, it was left to decay for two centuries. Artist Joseph Mallord William

Turner paid two visits to the site, and it inspired him to paint this piece which juxtaposes the

smallness of man alongside and wildness of nature, the unstoppable power of which has

reclaimed this man-made edifice. The haunting abbey was a popular muse for many

Romantics; it also inspired William Wordsworth’s famous poem “Lines Composed a Few

Miles above Tintern Abbey.”

“Fishermen at Sea,” by JMW Turner, 1794. Turner was fascinated by the mood of nature,

her ever changing effects. He was always sketching the clouds, the sky, and his natural

surroundings. Turner was particularly fascinated with the power of the ocean and said that

he had once asked to be lashed to the mast of a ship in order to “experience the drama” of

a mighty storm at sea.

Romantics believed that God’s presence was embodied in nature and evidence of His

existence. Turner saw light as a divine emanation and played with it in pictures to evoke that

truth.

“Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog,” by Caspar David Friedrich, 1818. German artist Caspar David

Friedrich was a quintessential Romantic artist, and this is a quintessential Romantic painting.

It conveys both the infinite potential and possibilities of man and the awesome, mysterious

grandeur of nature. The popular Romantic theme of the greatness of man contrasted with

the sublimity and power of nature is on display. The man has climbed high and conquered

much, only to see that there are infinite vistas still out there, shrouded in a fog that hides

what lies beyond. […]

“Abbey in an Oak Forest,” by Caspar David Friedrich, 1810. Another captivating painting by

Friedrich depicting the ruins of an abbey church which has become a graveyard. It captures

several different Romantic elements at once. Like in Turner’s abbey piece, nature has

reclaimed man’s handiwork. Friedrich loved to depict scenes in wintertime; the stark leafless

trees and gray pall evoked that sense of melancholy, yearning, and mystery that Romantics so

prized.

The Hudson River School

Inspired by the rugged, wild terrain of their (often adopted) nation and by the

philosophy of Transcendentalism, American Romantic artists painted vivid, detailed, and

sometimes idealized landscapes of the picturesque natural scenes by which they were

surrounded. Painters of this style were said to be members of the so-called Hudson River

School. The founder of this “school” was Thomas Cole, who captured the first landscapes

of the Hudson River Valley when he took a steamboat into the area in 1825 and journeyed

into the Catskill mountains. The second generation of these landscape artists ventured out of

New York state to capture the sweeping landscapes of the West. What the Hudson River

School artists had in common was a desire to convey both the sublimity and majesty of

nature and the energy of exploration and discovery that pulsed throughout the new nation.

The awe-inspiring vistas of the frontier were seen not just as manifestations of the hand of

God upon the land, and also as a source of national pride; while Europe had its old ruins

and architecture in which to glory, America had its natural monuments.

“The Clove Catskills,” by Thomas Cole, 1827. Thomas Cole, an Englishman used to more muted

fall colors, was awestruck by the fall foliage he took in on his trip into the Catskill Mountains

of New York.

“Looking Down Yosemite Valley,” by Albert Bierstadt, 1865. German-American artist Albert

Bierstadt left New York to capture the rugged beauty of the American West. As with other

Hudson River Valley artists, he would sketch the areas he explored, as painting on site was

impractical, and then turn the sketches into paintings upon returning home. The resulting

landscapes were often a combination of different features seen in various locations, and the

colors and especially the lighting were played with and intensified to heighten the awe-

inducing effect of the scene.

“Heart of the Andes,” Frederic Edwin Church, 1859. Church traveled outside the country to paint

the landscapes of South America. Like many of the Hudson River School artists, Church

painted this scene on a huge canvas, nearly five feet high and ten feet long. For those who

had not the means to travel west or leave the country, viewing these paintings was a way to

be transported to new places, and people would line up for a chance to pay admission to see

them. When Heart of the Andes was unveiled, it was bordered by curtains to give the feel of

looking out a window, and viewers were given opera glasses so that they might get a closer

look at the painting’s details.

”Aurora Borealis,” by Frederic Edwin Church, 1865. In a time before advanced photography,

Romantic paintings provided ordinary people a chance to see natural phenomena they would

never have an opportunity to witness themselves.

“Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone,” Thomas Moran, 1827. American landscape painters helped

inspire the movement to preserve the most beautiful parts of the country’s wilderness and to

create a national park system in order to do so. The sketches made by Thomas Moran when

he accompanied a geological survey team into the then unknown Yellowstone area were later

used to convince Congress to turn Yellowstone into a national park.

Two Series by Thomas Cole

To me, some of the most interesting paintings of the Romantic period are part of two series

done by Thomas Cole: The Course of Empire and The Voyage of Life. In these series Cole

depicts the different stages of life, both on the large scale level of civilization and the

personal scale of a man’s life.

The Course of Empire

Painted by Cole in 1833-36, The Course of Empire depicts five phases of civilization; a city

builds to grandeur and then decays. These paintings represented the Romantic fear that the

advancements of modern life were encroaching on the idyllic ways of the past and would

end up deteriorating the fabric of civilization.

The Savage State. Nature in its wild, untamed state. People are low-tech; a tribal man hunts

with bow and arrow. The great mysteries of nature are untrammeled and swirl about. The

sun is rising on the day. Look closely and you’ll see wigwams and a campfire, the seeds of a

city.

The Arcadian or Pastoral State. The skies have cleared and lightened, civilization has advanced.

A temple has been erected. An old philosopher-looking man writes with a stick. In the

distance, a man is plowing and women are dancing. The setting is idyllic. It’s a brilliant

morning, and the people live in peace, happiness, and harmony with nature.

The Consummation of Empire. Civilization has reached its peak. The population has grown and

erected great buildings and built great ships. It is late in the day. Besides the water and a hint

of vegetation here and there, nature has disappeared and been completely covered over.

The Destruction. The civilization crumbles. While an enemy army attacks the city, a tempest

rages. The great man-made monuments fall to pieces, the edifices ransacked, the people

killed.

Desolation. The sun has set on this civilization. Humans are nowhere to be found. Nature has

reclaimed the monuments of man. Sic transit gloria mundi. [“Thus pass the glories of the

world.]

The Voyage of Life

Painted by Cole in 1840, the Voyage of Life series depicts four stages of a man’s life and

serves as a Christian allegory set in a Romantic backdrop.

Childhood. The baby exits the dark canal and begins his new life. The water is calm and

smooth, the surroundings innocent and Edenic. The boy’s guardian angel grasps the tiller

and controls the boat.

Youth. The water is still smooth, the surroundings still peaceful and lush. But now the angel

leaves the boy, who eagerly takes the tiller himself and sets off on his own towards his lofty

dreams and ambitions. It is hard to tell from this image of the painting, but around the bend

of the river the water begins to get choppy and rough; journeying to the castle of his dreams

will not be as easy as it now seems.

Manhood. The boy is now a man. The vegetation is gone; the waters are choppy; the skies

have darkened. The tiller of the boat is gone; the man is no longer entirely in control, and he

prays for help. The angel still watches over him, but now from afar. The man cannot see the

angel and must have faith that she is there. Cole wanted to convey the way the dreams and

idealism of youth crash into the “realities of the world.” The ocean symbolizes the end of

the man’s life; he can begin to see it, and the warmth of the sunset hints of hope in the midst

of his trials.

Old Age. The man is now old and the angel returns to his side. His boat has made it to the

ocean. The waters are once more calm. The light is breaking through the dark clouds. The

man’s faith has sustained him throughout the trials of life and now the beauty of eternity

stretches out before him. […]

No art is meant to be seen as small images on a computer, but this is especially true

of Romantic art. It was designed by the artists to convey grand, sweeping landscapes that

expanded the spirit of man when viewed. So if there’s a museum in your town that has such

paintings on display, be sure to go and visit.

Sarah C. Schaffer: “The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters”

From smARThistory (2015)

Francisco Goya, Plate 43, The sleep of reason produces monsters from Los Caprichos, 1799, etching,

aquatint, drypoint, and burin, plate: 21.2 x 15.1 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)

A dark vision

In this ominous image, we see the dark vision of humanity that characterizes Goya’s

work for the rest of his life. A man sleeps, apparently peacefully, even as bats and owls

threaten from all sides and a lynx lays quiet, but wide-eyed and alert. Another creature sits at

the center of the composition, staring not at the sleeping figure, but at us. Goya forces the

viewer to become an active participant in the image––the monsters of his dreams even

threaten us. […]

On 6 February 1799, Francisco Goya put an advertisement in the Diario de Madrid.

“A Collection of Prints of Capricious Subjects,” he tells the reader, “Invented and Etched by

Don Francisco Goya,” is available through subscription. We know this series of eighty prints

as Los Caprichos (caprices, or follies).

Los Caprichos was a significant departure from the subjects that had occupied Goya

up to that point––tapestry cartoons for the Spanish royal residences, portraits of monarchs

and aristocrats, and a few commissions for church ceilings and altars.

Many of the prints in the Caprichos series express disdain for the pre-Enlightenment

practices still popular in Spain at the end of the Eighteenth century (a powerful clergy,

arranged marriages, superstition, etc.). Goya uses the series to critique contemporary Spanish

society. As he explained in the advertisement, he chose subjects “from the multitude of

follies and blunders common in every civil society, as well as from the vulgar prejudices and

lies authorized by custom, ignorance or interest, those that he has thought most suitable

matter for ridicule.”

The Caprichos was Goya’s most biting critique to date, and would eventually be

censored. Of the eighty aquatints, number 43, “The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters,”

can essentially be seen as Goya’s manifesto and it should be noted that many observers

believe he intended it as a self-portrait.

Imagination united with reason

In the image, an artist, asleep at his drawing table, is besieged by creatures associated

in Spanish folk tradition with mystery and evil. The title of the print, emblazoned on the

front of the desk, is often read as a proclamation of Goya’s adherence to the values of the

Enlightenment—without Reason, evil and corruption prevail.

However, Goya wrote a caption for the print that complicates its message,

“Imagination abandoned by reason produces impossible monsters; united with her, she is

the mother of the arts and source of their wonders.” In other words, Goya believed that

imagination should never be completely renounced in favor of the strictly rational. For

Goya, art is the child of reason in combination with imagination.

Figure asleep (detail), Francisco Goya, Plate 43, The sleep of reason produces monsters from Los Caprichos,

1799, etching, aquatint, drypoint, and burin, plate: 21.2 x 15.1 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)

[…] Goya’s caption for “The Sleep of Reason,” warns that we should not be

governed by reason alone—an idea central to Romanticism’s reaction against Enlightenment

doctrine. Romantic artists and writers valued nature which was closely associated with

emotion and imagination in opposition to the rationalism of Enlightenment philosophy. But

“The Sleep of Reason” also anticipates the dark and haunting art Goya later created in

reaction to the atrocities he witnessed—and carried out by the standard-bearers of the

Enlightenment—the Napoleonic Guard.

Goya brilliantly exploited the atmospheric quality of aquatint to create this fantastical

image. This printing process creates the grainy, dream-like tonality visible in the background

of “The Sleep of Reason.”

Aquatint

Birds (detail), Francisco Goya, Plate 43, The sleep of reason produces monsters from Los Caprichos, 1799,

etching, aquatint, drypoint, and burin, plate: 21.2 x 15.1 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Although the aquatint process was invented in 17th century by the Dutch printmaker,

Jan van de Velde, many consider the Caprichos to be the first prints to fully exploit this

process.

Aquatint is a variation of etching. Like etching, it uses a metal plate (often copper or

zinc) that is covered with a waxy, acid-resistant resin. The artist draws an image directly into

the resin with a needle so that the wax is removed exposing the metal plate below. When the

scratch drawing is complete, the plate is submerged in an acid bath. The acid eats into the

metal where lines have been etched. When the acid has bitten deeply enough, the plate is

removed, rinsed and heated so that the remaining resin can be wiped away.

Aquatint requires an additional process, the artist sprinkles layers of powdery resin on

the surface of the plate, heats it to harden the powder and dips it in an acid bath.

The acid eats around the resin powder creating a rich and varied surface. Ink is then

pressed into the pits and linear recesses created by the acid and the flat surface of the plate is

once again wiped clean. Finally, a piece of paper is pressed firmly against the inked plate and

then pulled away, resulting in the finished image.

Dr. Beth Harris & Dr. Stephen Zucker: “Monk by the Sea” From smARThistory (2015) Caspar David Friedrich’s “Monk by the Sea” is on of his most mysterious paintings. Despite simply being a picture of devoted many looking out to sea, the painting has inspired many a viewer with questions. Follow the link to the video to get further insight. (Please watch the video, but the article below is only optional.) Link to the Video: https://smarthistory.org/friedrich-monk-by-the-sea/

Michael john Partington: “John Nash, Royal Pavilion, Brighton” From smARThistory (2015)

“How can one describe such a piece of architecture? The style is a mixture of Moorish, Tartar, Gothic, and

Chinese and all in stone and iron. It is a whim which has already cost £700,000, and it is still not fit to live

in.”¹

Such was the verdict of the Austrian statesman Klemens von Metternich on the eclectic,

exotic and sensuous Royal Pavilion at Brighton.

While not all the contemporary reactions to the Pavilion were critical, John Evans, for

example, admired it for both its “beauty” and “grandeur,”² it was a building which provoked

a predominantly critical response in Regency England (in political terms the period from

1811 to 1820 when George, Prince of Wales—future George IV—ruled in place of his ailing

father George III; and in cultural terms up until the death of George IV in 1830). The New

Brighton Guide called it a “masterpiece of bad taste” while the Comtesse de Boigne declared

it a “mad-house.”³ And when Queen Victoria first visited the Royal Pavilion in 1837, she

noted, “The Pavilion is a strange, odd, Chinese looking place, both outside and inside. Most

of the rooms are low, and I can see a morsel of the sea, from one of my sitting room

windows.”4

John Nash, Royal Pavilion, Brighton, 1815-23 (photo (edited): Jim Linwood, CC BY 2.0)

The patron: The Prince Regent

The ostensible aesthetic randomness of the Pavilion is best comprehended as the material

expression of the profligate and rebellious life of its extraordinary benefactor, the Prince

Regent, the future George IV, undoubtedly the greatest royal patron of the arts since King

Charles I. A man of easy wit and charm, as well as political indolence and questionable

morals, the Prince was the touchstone of style for the fashion-conscious Georgian elite of

the day. He first visited the seaside resort of Brighton in 1783 to benefit from its reputedly

medicinal waters. Captivated by the picturesque promise of the area, the Prince purchased a

“superior farmhouse” in 1786 and engaged the royal architect Henry Holland to convert this

modest building into a Neo-Classical “marine pavilion” fit for a royal personage at play.

Under the influence of the Prince Regent, William Porden, Nash’s assistant, added a large

stables and riding school in the Indian style which would be the decorative prototype for the

“Oriental” incarnation of the Royal Pavilion by its principal architect, John Nash.

Undated print of Henry Holland’s Brighton Marine Pavilion of 1786-87

The architect: John Nash

John Nash was the perfect professional partner for the Pavilion’s colorful patron.

Subsequently criticized for an overly fashionable and reckless approach to architectural

practice, and a resultant lack of purity in the finished product, Nash had planned Regent’s

Street and Regent’s Park in London as a celebration of the rise of the new consumer classes.

John Nash, PLAN, presented to the House of Commons, of a STREET proposed from

CHARING CROSS to PORTLAND PLACE, leading to the Crown Estate in Marylebone

Park,” 1813.

Nash’s vision for Brighton was informed by the Prince’s aesthetic sensibilities and colorful

personality and the architect’s own experiences of the Picturesque (the beauty inherent in

unspoiled nature, as first outlined by the artist William Gilpin), as well as the aquatints of

“hindoo” architecture which appeared in the six-volume Oriental Scenery by the landscape

painters Thomas and William Daniell at the end of the 18th century. The result was the so-

called “Eastern” style, comprised of an assortment of architectural and design forms and

motifs taken from Britain’s colonial experience of the “Orient.”

John Nash, Royal Pavilion, Brighton, 1815-23 (photo (edited): Karen Roe, CC BY 2.0)

The “Eastern” style

Without denying the central agency of both the bold-thinking Nash and fashion-conscious

Prince Regent in the design of the Royal Pavilion, the range and variety of architectural styles

should be viewed within the context of a wider cultural tradition just then emerging. This

exotic mad-house was a response to the early British Empire and its East India Company (a

trading company established in 1600 with a fleet of ships and an army 200,000 strong) that

facilitated the rule of the Indian sub-continent for some two hundred years and which

shaped the British Empire. Here was trade from the East, a rich complex of cultural

interchange, and a fascination for the “Orient” in its widest, and loosest, colonial meaning.

As the architectural historian Ian Sutton has written, in the nineteenth century, “Both

[architects] and their patrons were assailed by new temptations which they found difficult to

resist.”5

William Chambers, Great Pagoda, 1762, Kew Gardens, London (photo: Targeman, public

domain)

The Pavilion was not in fact the first building in England to respond to the exotic world of

the nabobs (officials who had acquired great wealth) of the East India Company (see for

example William Chambers’ Great Pagoda, 1762, at Kew Gardens above, and C.P.

Cockerell’s Sezincote, 1810 in Gloucestershire below).

C.P. Cockerell, Sezincote, 1810 (photo (edited): Pradeep Sanders, CC BY 2.0)

Both buildings predate the Pavilion. Moreover, juxtaposing a culturally alien interior to the

exterior was not a new idea, and was in some sense a colonial interpretation of the cultures

of the lands of Empire. Henry Holland’s French Neo-Classical Carlton House, 1783–96 in

London, for example, boasted a fine Chinese drawing room. As such, Brighton Pavilion

could be seen as the culmination of years of experimentation, rather than a one-off, stand-

alone enterprise.

John Nash, Royal Pavilion, Brighton, 1815-23 (photo (edited): Tony Hisgett, CC BY 2.0)

What does mark Brighton Pavilion out from the above examples, however, is its

fundamental expression of Regency England Romanticism derived from the world of letters.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s opium-fueled poem “Kubla Khan,” a classic of Romantic

literature, published in 1816, famously speaks of the “stately pleasure-dome” of the Mongol

ruler. One of the confidants of the Prince Regent was William Beckford, notorious hedonist

and author of Vathek: An Arabian Tale (1786), whose earlier story of the outrageous ninth

Caliph of Abassides was inspired by both The Arabian Nights and Horace Walpole’s The

Castle of Oltranto (1764), the latter being the novel that ushered in the Gothic genre in

English literature. Indeed, the only true architectural precursor to the Pavilion in this

Romantic Gothic tradition is probably Walpole’s own Strawberry Hill (see image below), an

early example of Gothic Revival architecture, which applies “Gothick” forms and motifs in a

similarly imaginative way as the Pavilion.

Strawberry Hill House from garden in 2012 after restoration (photo: Chiswick Chap, CC

BY-SA 3.0)

The “Indian” exterior

Architecturally, the “Indian” exterior owes much to C.P. Cockerell’s Sezincote; however,

there is in reality a significant difference which speaks of the changing fashions and the

further development of exotic eclecticism in this period. Sezincote is hybridic: it retains a

Neo-Classical facade (the windows and bays), whilst sporting a turquoise onion-shaped

Mughul dome and minarets, typical of Islamic architecture of the Indian sub-continent, such

as the Taj Mahal, and features a Hindu-inspired garden, including a temple.

John Nash. The Royal Pavilion at Brighton (detail), 1827 © British Library Board

The Pavilion’s exterior, on the other hand, is more uniformly Mughal-flavored, albeit shot

through with a generic sense of the “Orient”: namely the arabesque profusion of ten domes

and ten minarets, supported by a cast iron frame, and the vertical thrust of the building,

giving it a sense of lightness and airiness, an almost dream-like temporary tent-like quality, in

opposition to the permanent horizontal-axised stout square-blockedness of Sezincote.

John Nash, “Chinese Gallery As It Was [Long Gallery],” Plate XV in Illustrations of Her

Majesty’s Palace at Brighton, J. B. Nichols and Son, London, 1838, etching and aquatint,

brush and watercolor, letterpress on white wove paper mounted on heavy tan board, ruled

lines in color and gold paint (Cooper–Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum)

The “Chinese” interior

As for the interior of the Pavilion, while England’s curiosity for Chinese culture predates

that of its interest in Indian civilization by almost a century, the former’s application to the

inside of Nash’s building is complex, for we have in fact the Neo-Classical, Chinese and

Gothic at work together. The Entrance Hall (see image below), for instance, is symmetrically

arranged, as per the Neo-Classical; while the Long Gallery (see image above) contains a

multitude of generic Chinese/Asian features (“Chinoiserie”), including the hexagonal

lanterns, the silk tassels and the motif of bamboo and birds on the wallpaper, the work of

interior decorator Frederick Crace.

John Nash, “Entrance Hall,” Illustrations of Her Majesty’s Palace at Brighton, J. B. Nichols

and Son, London, 1838

Finally, the decoration along the cornice in the Entrance Hall, and in the Banqueting Room

Gallery, is clearly related to fan-vaulting found in English medieval churches.

Music Room, Brighton Pavilion (photo (edited): Richard Rutter, CC BY 2.0)

Making sense of a ‘mad-house’

The Royal Pavilion at Brighton in all its apparent kaleidoscopic silliness, brashness, vitality,

phantasmagoric contradictions and oppositions, references, and tries—though not always

succeeds—to respond to the tastes of a new fashionable elite at home and to make sense (or

not) of a new world of empire abroad. Indeed, in all its range and variety, as well as in its

playful eccentricities, it is quite possibly the ultimate architectural manifestation of early

nineteenth-century eclecticism, as well as being the material personification of a powerful

Regency personality and his private architect. The history of architecture in Britain is all the

richer as a result.

Ben Pollitt: “François Rude’s La Marseillaise and The Arc of Triumph” From smARThistory.org (2015)

François Rude, La Marseillaise (The Departure of the Volunteers of 1792), 1833-6, limestone, c. 12.8 m

high, Arc de Triomphe de l’Etoile, Paris [Photo By Jebulon - Own work, CC0,

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=28305582)]

Rude before The Departure

François Rude had revolution in his blood. At eight years-old, he watched his father, a

stovemaker, join the volunteer army to defend the new French Republic (this is shortly after

the French Revolution) from the threat of foreign invasion. Fiercely loyal himself, as a young

man he was a Bonapartist (a follower of the emperor Napoleon Bonaparte). His support for

the Emperor during the Cent Jours of 1814, when Napoleon returned to France from exile

and tried to seize power from the newly restored monarch Louis XVIII, meant that Rude

was forced to leave the country when Napoleon was finally defeated in 1815. Like the

painter David, another ardent Bonapartist, he lived for some years in Belgium, returning to

his native country in 1827.

His reputation grew over the next ten years, reaching its peak with the justly famous La

Marseillaise (The Departure of the Volunteers of 1792) [ It depicts the angry French

Revolutionaries rising up against the king and aristocrats, led by the Genius (spirit) of

Liberty. There is wild fervour in their eyes, and a love both for a newfound freedom they

envision, and the lust for blood that would result in the Reign of Terror and the

Guillotine…]

The Arc de Triomphe

The Departure of the Volunteers of 1792, also known as La Marseillaise, is a different work

entirely, more in keeping with what one now thinks of as Romantic; like a Beethoven

symphony: intense, rousing, full of drama and movement.

Jean Chalgrin: “Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile,” 1806-1836, h. 50 x w. 45 x d. 22 m, Paris

It is Rude’s masterpiece and one of the best-known sculptures in the world. Its

location has obviously contributed to its fame, attached as a bas-relief to the right foot of the

façade of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris—on the Champs-Elysées facing side. An enormous

fifty meters high structure, designed to celebrate France’s military achievements in 1806 by

Jean Chalgrin, the arch’s construction was begun under Napoleon’s orders but remained

unfinished when finally he was defeated in 1815. […]

The project was picked up again during the Constitutional Monarchy of Louis-

Philippe (1830-48). The arch’s sculptural programme, seen by the king and his ministers as

an ideal opportunity to promote national reconciliation, aimed to offer something that would

please every segment of the French political spectrum. […]

On the opposite side of the arch is Antoine Étex’s war and peace pendant group, The

Resistance of 1814 and Peace—the former a stirring image of Napoleon’s supporters who

continued to fight after his return from exile, the latter, appealing to the monarchists, an

allegorical depiction of the Treaty of Paris that saw the restoration of the Bourbon royal

dynasty.

Left: Antoine Étex, Peace, 1833–36, Limestone, Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile, Paris; Right:

Antoine Étex, The Resistance, 1833–36, Limestone, Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile, Paris

(photos: Wally Gobetz, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

When the arch was officially unveiled in 1836, there was unanimous agreement that Rude’s

group made the other three pale into insignificance.

The sculpture and the song

The subject of Rude’s La Marseillaise (The Departure of the Volunteers of 1792) com

memorates the Battle of Valmy when the French defended the Republic against an attack

from the Austro-Prussian army. The popular title for the work, La Marseillaise, is the name

of the French national anthem, which was written in 1792 by the army officer Claude Joseph

Rouget de Lisle as part of a recruitment campaign. It was sung by a young volunteer, later to

become a general under Napoleon, at a patriotic gathering in Marseille, the city from which

the song gets its name, and was subsequently adopted as the army’s rallying cry.

Allons enfants de la Patrie, Le jour de gloire est arrivé ! Contre nous de la tyrannie L'étendard sanglant est levé, (bis) Entendez-vous dans les campagnes Mugir ces féroces soldats ?

Arise, children of the Fatherland, The day of glory has arrived! Against us, tyranny's Bloody standard is raised, (repeat) Do you hear, in the countryside, The roar of those ferocious soldiers?

Ils viennent jusque dans vos bras Égorger vos fils, vos compagnes ! Aux armes, citoyens, Formez vos bataillons, Marchons, marchons ! Qu'un sang impur Abreuve nos sillons ! Que veut cette horde d'esclaves, De traîtres, de rois conjurés ? Pour qui ces ignobles entraves, Ces fers dès longtemps préparés ? (bis) Français, pour nous, ah! quel outrage Quels transports il doit exciter ! C'est nous qu'on ose méditer De rendre à l'antique esclavage !

They're coming right into your arms To cut the throats of your sons, your women! To arms, citizens, Form your battalions, Let's march, let's march! Let their impure blood Water our furrows! What does this horde of slaves, Of traitors and conspiring kings want? For whom have these vile chains, These irons, been long prepared? (repeat) Frenchmen, for us, ah! What outrage What furious action it must arouse! It is to us they dare plan A return to the old slavery!

“Genius of Liberty” (detail), François Rude, La Marseillaise (The Departure of the Volunteers of 1792),

1833-6, limestone, c. 12.8 m high, Arc de Triomphe de l’Etoile, Paris

Banned under the Bourbon administration, [the song] was sounded by the crowds on the

barricades in the July Revolution of 1830 and in the following years grew in popularity, the

Romantic composer Hector Berlioz, for instance, giving it an orchestral arrangement.

Having lodged itself so deeply in the public consciousness, evoking the spirit of republican

defiance in the face of tyranny, the song must surely have been in Rude’s mind when

drawing his designs for the sculpture.

The surge of the volunteers, inspired by the great sweeping movement of the Genius of

Liberty above them, effectively illustrates in limestone the penultimate verse of the song:

Sacred love of the Fatherland,

Lead, support our avenging arms

Liberty, cherished Liberty,

Fight with thy defenders!

Under our flags, shall victory

Hurry to thy manly accents,

See thy triumph and our glory!

[…] Rude’s sculpture effectively captures the energy of the new republic, more so

perhaps than anything to be found in the art of the 1792 generation. It was their children, it

seems, imbued with tales of heroic sacrifice, who, employing this epic, revolutionary style,

known as Romanticism, brought to light the passion and the glory and, in the case of

Delacroix, the hideous spectacle of death, too, that went into forging the new France.

Dr. Beth Harris & Dr. Steven Zucker: “The Apotheosis of Homer” From smARThistory (2015)

Though romantics were not much interested in recapturing the style of ancient classical times, they did love to portray the ancient world in their art. One painter, Ingres, took as his subject the legendary poet Homer, known as author of The Iliad and The Odyssey, the epic poems telling the story of the ten year long siege of the City Troy and the adventures of the Greek heroes who faced monsters and trials returning home from the war. It has been posited that no one person other than Jesus had a greater influence on the world after his death. Greek civilization formed itself around the myths, heroes, ideals, and themes in Homer’s work – mortals like wrathful general Achilles, clever but deceptive king Odysseus, bold yet conflicted Hector, cowardly and ridiculous Paris, faithful wife Penelope, and young, inexperienced Telemachus, as well as gods like thunderous Zeus, wise Athena, warlike Ares, vengeful Poseidon, and all the rest, captured the hearts of all Greece and later Rome. Homer’s work influenced law, religion, politics, and of course, every form of the arts. In this famous work of art by the great painter Ingres, homer is crowned king of the arts. Follow the link to discover more about this painting. Link to the article:

https://smarthistory.org/ingres-apotheosis-of-homer/

Dr. Beth Harris & Dr. Stephen Zucker: “The Hay Wain” From smARThistory (2018) In the early nineteenth century, the face of England was completely changing. The Industrial Revolution, with its bold leaps in machinery, engineering, inventions, and the factory system, transformed not only the means of production, but the entire way people lived. Many country folks found their livelihoods threatened, at the new machines could far outdo them in their crafts at least in terms of speed, making a quicker profit for the factory masters. The country folk, in many places had to abandon their rural lives and seek employment in the cities if they wanted to eat. As communities urbanized, the landscape changed radically. But the great painter John Constable hung on fiercely to the beautiful landscape of the England he knew before the Industrial Revolution. Watch this video to learn more about one of his most famous paintings, “The Hay Wain,” and how it challenged people’s perceptions of what made a worthy subject or technique for a painting. Link to the video: https://smarthistory.org/hay-wain/

Dr. Rebecca Jeffrey Easby: “A Beginner’s Guide to the Pre-Raphaelites” From smARThistory (2015)

William Holman Hunt, The flight of Madeline and Porphyro during the drunkenness attending the revelry

(The Eve of St. Agnes), smaller version of the painting exhibited at the Royal Academy, begun as a sketch,

1847-57, oil on panel, 355 x 252 cm (Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool)

At first they were three

During a visit to the Royal Academy exhibition of 1848, the young artist and poet

Dante Gabriel Rossetti was drawn to a painting entitled The Eve of Saint Agnes by William

Holman Hunt. As a subject taken from the poetry of John Keats was a rarity at the time,

Rossetti sought out Hunt, and the two quickly became friends. Hunt then introduced

Rossetti to his friend John Everett Millais, and the rest, as they say, is history. The trio went

on to form the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, a group determined to reform the artistic

establishment of Victorian England.

Looking back to look forward

The name “Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood” (PRB) hints at the vaguely medieval subject

matter for which the group is known. The young artists appreciated the simplicity of line and

large flat areas of brilliant color found in the early Italian painters before Raphael, as well as

in 15th century Flemish art. [They also despised Raphael, because he had brought into

fashion the more stiff and stylized type of portrait rather than one that portrayed natural

pose and movement.] These were not qualities favored by the more academic approach

taught at the Royal Academy during the mid 19th century, which stressed the strong light

and dark shading of the Old Masters. Another source of inspiration for the young artists was

the writing of art critic John Ruskin, particularly the famous passage from Modern

Painters telling artists:

[“From young artists, in landscape, nothing ought to be tolerated but simple bona

fide imitation of nature. They have no business to ape the execution of masters,—to

utter weak and disjointed repetitions of other men's words[…]. We do not want their

crude ideas of composition, their unformed conceptions of the Beautiful, their

unsystematized experiments upon the Sublime. […]. Their duty is neither to choose, nor

compose, nor imagine, nor experimentalize; but to be humble and earnest in following

the steps of nature, and tracing the finger of God. Nothing is so bad a symptom, in the

work of young artists, as too much dexterity of handling; for it is a sign that they

are .satisfied with their work, and have tried to do nothing more than they were able to

do. Their work should be full of failures; for these are the signs of efforts.

They should keep to quiet colors—grays and browns; and, making the early works

of Turner their example, as his latest are to be their object of emulation, should go to

nature in all singleness of heart, and walk with her laboriously and trustingly, having

no other thoughts but how best to penetrate her meaning, and remember her

instruction, rejecting nothing, selecting nothing, and scorning nothing; believing all

things to be right and good, and rejoicing always in the truth. Then, when their

memories are stored, and their imaginations fed, and their hands firm, let them take

up the scarlet and the gold, give the reins to their fancy, and show us what their heads

are made of. We will follow them wherever they choose to lead; we will check at

nothing; they are then our masters, and are fit to be so. They have placed themselves

above our criticism, and we will listen to their words in all faith and humility; but not

unless they themselves have before bowed, in the same submission, to a higher

Authority and Master.” – John Ruskin, Modern Painters, 1843]

This combination of influences contributed to the group’s extreme attention to detail,

and the development of the wet white ground technique that produced the brilliant color for

which they are known. The artists even became some of the first to complete sections of

their canvases outdoors in an effort to capture the minute detail of every leaf and blade of

grass.

And then they were seven

It was decided that seven was the appropriate number for a rebellious group and four

others were added to form the initial Brotherhood. The selection of additional members has

long mystified art historians. James Collinson, a painter, seems to have been added due to his

short-lived engagement to Rossetti’s sister Christina rather than his sympathy with the cause.

Another member, Thomas Woolner, was a sculptor rather than a painter. The final two

members, William Michael Rossetti and Frederic George Stephens, both of whom went on

to become art critics, were not practicing artists. However, other young artists such as Walter

Howell Deverell and Charles Collins embraced the ideals of the PRB even though they were

never formally elected as members.

John Everett Millais, Isabella, 1848-49, oil on canvas, 103 x 142.8 cm (Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool)

The P.R.B. goes public

The Pre-Raphaelites decided to make their debut by sending a group of paintings, all

bearing the initials “PRB”, to the Royal Academy in 1849. However, Rossetti, who was

nervous about the reception of his painting The Girlhood of Mary Virgin, changed his mind

and instead sent his painting to the earlier Free Exhibition (meaning there was no jury as

there was at the Royal Academy). At the Royal Academy, Hunt exhibited Rienzi, the Last of

the Tribunes, a scene from an historical novel of the same name by Edward Bulwer-Lytton.

Millais exhibited Isabella, another subject from Keats, created with such attention to detail

that one can actually see the beheading scene on the plate nearest the edge of the table,

which echoes the ultimate fate of the young lover Lorenzo in the story. In both paintings,

the accurately designed medieval costumes, bright colors and attention to detail produced

criticism that the paintings mimicked a “mediaeval illumination of the chronicle or the

romance” (Athenaeum, 2 June 1849, p. 575). Interestingly, no mention was made of the

mysterious “PRB” inscription.

Critical reaction

In 1850, however, the reaction to the PRB was very different. By this time, many

people knew about the existence of the supposedly secret society, in part because the group

had published many of their ideas in a short-lived literary magazine entitled The Germ.

Rossetti’s Ecce Ancilla Domini appeared at the Free Exhibition along with a painting by his

friend Deverell entitled Twelfth Night. At the Royal Academy, Hunt’s A Converted British

Family Sheltering a Christian Priest from the Persecution of the Druids and Millais’s Christ

in the House of his Parents, famously abused by Charles Dickens, received the brunt of the

criticism. In the aftermath of the humiliating reception of their work, Collinson resigned

from the group and Rossetti decided never again to exhibit publicly.

Ruskin to the rescue

Charles Allston Collins, Convent Thoughts, 1851, oil on canvas, 84 x 59 cm (Ashmolean Museum of

Art)

Undeterred, Millais and Hunt again continued to exhibit paintings demonstrating the

beautiful colors and detail orientation of the mature style of the PRB. The Royal Academy of

1851 included Hunt’s Valentine Rescuing Sylvia, and three pictures by Millais, Mariana, The

Woodman’s Daughter, and The Return of the Dove to the Ark as well as Convent

Thoughts by Millais’s friend Charles Collins. Although many were still dubious about the

new style, the critic John Ruskin came to the rescue of the group, publishing two letters

in The Times newspaper in which he praised the relationship of the PRB to early Italian art.

Although Ruskin was suspicious of what he termed the group’s “Catholic tendencies,” he

liked the attention to detail and the color of the PRB paintings. Ruskin’s praise helped

catapult the young artists to a new level.

The dissolution of the PRB

The Brotherhood, however, was slowly dissolving. Woolner emigrated to Australia in

1852. Hunt decided in January 1854 to visit the Holy Land in order to better paint religious

pictures. And, in an event Rossetti described as the formal end of the PRB, Millais was

elected as an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1853, joining the art establishment he had

fought hard to change.

Lasting impact

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Bocca Baciata (Lips That Have Been Kissed), 1859, oil on panel, 32.1 x 27 cm

(Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

Despite the fact that the Brotherhood lasted only a few short years, its impact was

immense. Millais and Hunt both went on to establish important places for themselves in the

Victorian art world. Millais was to go on to become an extremely popular artist, selling his

art works for vast sums of money, and ultimately being elected as the President of the Royal

Academy. Hunt, who perhaps stayed most true to the Pre-Raphaelite aesthetic, became a

well-known artist and wrote many articles and books on the formation of the Brotherhood.

Rossetti became a mentor to a group of younger artists including Edward Burne-

Jones and William Morris, founder of the Arts and Crafts Movement. Rossetti’s paintings of

beautiful women also helped inaugurate the new Aesthetic Movement, or the taste for Art

for Art’s Sake, in the later Victorian era.

Edward Burne-Jones, The Adoration of the Magi, 1904, tapestry, 101.57 x 148.42″ (Musée d’Orsay)

To a contemporary audience, the Pre-Raphaelites may appear less than modern. However, in

their own time the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood accomplished something revolutionary.

They were one of the first groups to value painting out-of-doors for its “truth to nature,”

and their concept of banding together to take on the art establishment helped to pave the

way for later groups. The distinctive elements of their paintings, such as the extreme

attention to detail, the brilliant colors and the beautiful rendition of literary subjects set them

apart from other Victorian painters.

Robert Lacey: “Rain, Steam & Speed,” From Great Tales from English History (2007)

JMW Turner: “Rain, Steam & Speed,” 1844, National Gallery, London

One June evening in 1843 a young woman, Jane O’Meara, was travelling to London

on the recently constructed Great Western Railway through a terrifying storm. Thunder

roared and lightning flashed across the countryside, while torrents of sheeting rain attacked

the window – so Jane was surprised when one of the elderly gentleman travelling in her First

Class carriage asked if she would mind him putting down the rain-blurred window. He

wanted to take a look outside.

Politely consenting, Jane was still more surprised when her travelling companion

thrust his head and shoulders out into the storm and kept them resolutely there for nearly

nine minutes. The old man was evidently engrossed with what he saw, and when he finally

drew back in, drenched, the young woman could not resist the temptation to put her own

head out of the window – to be astonished by a blurred cacophony of sound and brightness.

The train was standing at that moment in Bristol Temple Meads Station, and the mingled

impression of steam, sulphurous smoke and the flickering glow from the engine’s firebox

overwhelmed her – ‘such a chaos of elemental and artificial lights and noises,’ she later

wrote, ‘I never saw or heard, or expect to see or hear.’

Almost a year later, going to look at the new pictures being hung in the summer’s

Royal Academy exhibition, Jane O’Meara suddenly realised who the eccentric traveller must

have been. For hanging on the gallery wall, depicted in swirling and unconventional swathes

of paint, was the same scary yet compelling vortex of light and turbulence that she had seen

from her GWR carriage window – “Rain, Steam & Speed” by J.M.W. Turner.

By 1844 Joseph Mallord William Turner was a renowned, controversial and highly

successful artist. He was born sixty-nine years earlier to a poor barber-wigmaker near

London’s Covent Garden fruit and vegetable market, and a mentally fragile mother who

ended her days in the Bethlehem Hospital for Lunatics – ‘Bedlam.’ Turner retained his gruff

Cockney accent all his life, along with a shrewd commercial spirit that dated back to the days

when he exhibited his first paintings in his father’s shop at one shilling (5p) each.

JMW Turner: “Self Portrait,” 1799, Tate Gallery, London

Turner’s wild, tumultuous and almost abstract paintings were denounced as “mad” by

many Victorians. But the French painters Monet, Renoir, Pissarro and Degas would later pay

tribute to ‘the illustrious Turner’ as the artist whose interest in ‘the fugitive effects of light’

inspired their own great revolution in ways of seeing – Impressionism. Monet came to

London as a young artist to study “Rain, Steam and Speed” which, from the moment of its

first hanging in the Royal Academy, was acknowledged by both its admirers and its

detractors to be an extraordinary creation. ‘The world has never seen anything like this

picture,’ declared the novelist William Thackery.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Fighting Temeraire, 1839, oil on canvas, 90.7 x 121.6 cm (The

National Gallery, London)

The central feature of the picture was the glowing ‘chaos’ of light and energy that has

shocked Jane O’Meara in Temple Meads Station – transposed by Turner to Brunel’s famous

bridge at Maidenhead in the Thames Valley, one of the artist’s favourite locales for

sketching. Enveloped in smoke and mist, the dark and sinister funnel of the locomotive is

dashing forwards out of the canvas, a black stovepipe cutting ferociously through the

slanting rain, while in front of the careering train- only visible if you step up to the canvas

and peer closely – runs a terrified little brown hare, the creature that used to symbolise speed

in the age before machines.

“Rain, Steam and Speed” now hangs in the National Gallery in London’s Trafalgar

Square. Standing back from the foaming confusion of colour and textures, you cannot help

but be struck by the majesty of the world’s first great railway painting. You can also

recapture the excitement of Jane O’Meara, putting her head out into the storm to see what

had caught the visionary eye of Joseph Mallord William Turner.

Dennis Malone Carter: Oil painting of “Decatur Boarding the Tripolitan Gunboat during the bombardment

of Tripoli”, 3 August 1804. Lieutenant Stephen Decatur (lower right center) in mortal combat with the

Tripolitan Captain.

Louis Janmot: “The Poem of the Soul: The Grain of Wheat”, 1854

ATTRIBUTIONS

p. 1, Brett and Kate MacKay, “The Basics of Art – The Romantic Period” from “The Art of Manliness,”

March 3, 2011, Accessed October 2, 2020, Sarah C. Schaefer, "Francisco Goya, The Sleep of

Reason Produces Monsters," in Smarthistory, August 9, 2015, accessed September 7,

2020, https://smarthistory.org/goya-the-sleep-of-reason-produces-monsters/.

p. 21, Sarah C. Schaefer, "Francisco Goya, The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters," in Smarthistory,

August 9, 2015, accessed October 2, 2020, https://smarthistory.org/goya-the-sleep-of-reason-

produces-monsters/.

p. 25, Michael John Partington, "John Nash, Royal Pavilion, Brighton," in Smarthistory, August 9, 2015,

accessed October 2, 2020, https://smarthistory.org/john-nash-royal-pavilion-brighton/.

p.34, Ben Pollitt, "François Rude, La Marseillaise," in Smarthistory, August 9, 2015, accessed September

7, 2020, https://smarthistory.org/rude-la-marseillaise/.

Dr. Rebecca Jeffrey Easby, "A beginner’s guide to the Pre-Raphaelites," in Smarthistory, August 9, 2015,

accessed September 7, 2020, https://smarthistory.org/a-beginners-guide-to-the-pre-raphaelites/.

Robert Lacey, “Rain, Steam & Speed,” from Great Tales from English History, Back Bay Books, New York, NY: 2007, p. 36.

All Smarthistory sources licensed under Non-Commercial- ShareAlike 4.0 International License