Delacroix considered himself to be a 'pure classicist'. What evidence is there in his work to support or refute this? Discuss.


There are two sides of Delacroix, one classical, the other Romantic. Although he considered himself to be a 'pure classicist', we can find features from both categories in a range of his work. Romantic features being subject not Italianate, the depiction of a dramatic movement, broken colours and free technique, Neoclassical features in composition and the subject matter in later works.

Delacroix, although named on 'Romantic artist' by his contemporaries, he felt that his understanding in the making of a truly great work of art in the manner of the antique is more accurate than David or Ingres.

In his first large painting, The Barque of Dante (1822), we see a use of tragic subject arranged in a neoclassical composition, with the large figures forced forward in the picture plane. In Massacre in Chios (1824), we see again figures lined up along the picture plane. In contrast to this composition, the subject's exotic orientalism and savage cruelty is closely connected to the contemporary romantic movement. The free technique employed too, connected it to Romantic, this is influenced by Constable's Haywain (1821).

In the late 1820s, Delacroix arrived to his high point in Romantic work. The Sardanapalus (1827) consisted a full and powerful romantic and orgiastic in both content and form. Delacroix rendered a pandemonium of passion, a whirling mixture of animal and human forms, beautiful flesh of women, dark Negroes, caparisoned horses and smoky clouds. The whole is a tremendous theatrical image in a diagonal plane, fully colouristic and altogether romantic.

Liberty Leading the people (1830) presents the July Revolution. With his goddess of freedom in bare breasts, blowing hair, holding a flintlock and waving the tricolour. As a composition, the Liberty is more unity as a whole, though the movement is considerably greater and the romantic asymmetrical structure much freer. The image's effect lies in its extraordinary brilliance of colour, and chiaroscuro; with an imaginative concept and a contemporary feeling forcefully united.

In 1832, Delacroix made his journey to Morocco, which greatly influenced his art in general, and particularly his colour. While in Morocco, he felt that he had the true antiquity before his eyes. It is more alive, more antique than any of the cold and bored formulas taught in the academies. Along with his studies of topography and costume, he studied the intense light and colour in Morocco. He noted, the law of complementary, that the native with yellowish skin casts purple shadows; and the ones with reddish colouring showed greenish shadows.

Women of Algiers (1834) continued the colourism of the earlier works. It is rich in colour; the form is firm and close in technique to those in Liberty , yet the modeling is more gentle, the tone more subtle and the light and dark contrasts less extreme. In its mood of balanced, formal clarity and shallow picture space, the Women of Algiers is a fundamentally classical work, but a comparison to Ingres's Odalisque with Slave, it showed how little Delacroix was attracted to the neoclassical linearity and the traditional notion of perspective construction.

The vein of Delacroix's romanticism can always be trace in his battle scenes, in Battle of Taillebourg (1837), with its warlike fanfare and echoes to Ruben's Battle of Amazon, it depicted the battling of men and horses, the furious hand to hand fights, the bloodshed, the eyes dilated by terror and rage and the smoke of fire. The field of vision is reduced, giving a more direct immediacy. The setting dictates much of the movement of the scene. The wedge is at an angle of the two movements converging. Delacroix attenuates the descending of the group, from right to left, by the use of compositional devices, such as the big diagonal shadow and a series of points and angles stressed by the upraised arms of the warriors.

Delacroix's later works showed a re-emergence of the use of classical composition and subject matter with the ever-increasing freedom of technique. His first major work of classical re-affirmation is his Medea and her Children (1838). Medea reflected the influence of Raphael and Leonardo da Vinci in the shadowed landscape and the plants and flowers in the foreground. The pyramid of the three bodies reflects Raphael's La Belle Jardiniere (1507). The modeling and outline of the figures showed sculptural solidity. The composition is arranged to show symmetry, between the eyes of Medea's and those of her elder son, and between this son's thigh and the younger child's calves.

Vastly different from Medea in expression, scale and historical association is another classical painting, Justice of Trajan (1840). It is a rich composition; with the Roman columnar of the background dissect the diagonal movement with its vertical rise. The board pyramid of the principal group is supported against the central column, but also swept by the movement of the rearing warhorse. More important is the fusion of decoration, narration and expression. Delacroix arranged all detail and gives the emphasis on the essential story. The spatial organization is clearer and the pictorial construction is more controlled. A further indication of Delacroix's interest in classical subject is The Last Words of Marcus Aurelius (1844).

The brilliance of movement of colour in Delacroix's work is connected to the excitement and movement of his romantic subject, such as the lion hunts and the human/ angel's battle. The wild beast hunts is a recurring theme in Delacroix's works, and it often led him back to the whirling composition. There are three version of the Lion Hunts, they all expand him on his memories of Ruben's and of Morocco. The first version in Bordeaux, is more closely associated with Ruben's Lion hunt, with the figures close together in the foreground cluster. The later variant utilized a deeper picture space, within which the figures appeared relatively small. The final form in California, showed a close unity of effect and an urgency of movement.

In Jacob Wrestling with the Angel (1853), Delacroix sourced a biblical narrative. The focus of the picture is on the two main figures locked in their mystical struggle. The strong diagonal movement to the left is balanced by the great oak tree in the upper right. The colour structure here is based on contrasts: the modulated greens of the foreground landscape to the atmospheric blue and orange-yellow in the dawning sky at the left.

The costume of the figures introduced a bolder colour of blue, red, and yellow. It is Jacobthat most strongly demonstrates the freedom of technique, the interweaved colour produce a complexity in the tonal structure.

Delacroix believed the use of both neoclassical and romantic features bring unity to the great work of art. The romantic features that we recognized today, were use in this 'unity effect' by him, who believed this is the correct approach used by pure classicist in the manner of the ancients.



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