Thursday, June 4, 2009

Fabulous Art: Paul Delaroche:La Jeune Martyre

The first thing i need to explain is that, I'm not very good with the camera, I surprise myself all the time when i take a pic that is not half bad, so I'm excused for having such shocking pics of Paul Delaroche's La Jeune Martyre. I took these picture at the Louvre Museum on my last visit to Paris, this is the original, when i took the pictures, i didnt know it was well known, it just captivated me and I remember falling in love with the calming yet haunting effect it had on me. I think the close friend I was with actually knew more about it. Also i never thought I'd ever use this picture to blog about it, was just a memory for myself so i could have the name of the artist, well until this morning when i saw on Mr Condescending's blog post about his favourite paintings and this one had made the cut, made me want to post my shoddy pics i took of the original piece. Paul Delaroche (17 July 1797 – 4 November 1856) was a French painter born in Paris. Delaroche was born into a wealthy family and was trained by Antoine-Jean, Baron Gros, who then painted life-size histories and had many students. The first Delaroche picture exhibited was the large Josabeth saving Joas (1822). This exhibition led to his acquaintance with Théodore Géricault &Eugène Delacroix, with whom he became friends. The La Jeune Martyre, which shows a young female martyr floating dead on the Tiber is one of many very important works by Delaroche.

9 comments:

  1. I've been to the Louvre but missed this piece :-(

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  2. I love this painting. I first saw it in the Louvre, didn't know anything about Delaroche, but was definitely lightning struck when I saw it. Does anyone know what scene it is from, what story it is telling? I have a great reproduction of this painting, but only the close-up of the floating dead maiden. As I recall, the actual painting has some large standing rocks on the shore, with a man leading a horse away between them, into the sunset, or sunrise?

    Kate

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  3. does anyone know in what wing it is located?

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  4. Het ligt in het Denon van het Louvre in kamer 76

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  5. It is in the Denon wing of the Louvre, room 76

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  6. An interesting thing to note, the face of the young woman in the painting is Louise Vernet, Delaroche's young, deceased wife. Married for only 10 years, she died in 1845 and he never recovered from her loss.

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  7. I was in Louvre last week and i had the same calming but yet shocking feeling when i saw this painting. I bought a post card and mailed it to myself and now i am digging up some history of the painting. Awesome pictures!! There's something in the painting that my words cannot describe!!

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  8. My reaction when I saw this painting was the same as others have described here. It was 18 years ago, but I still remember being awestruck. It was my favorite piece in the entire place.

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