This major international exhibition explores the relationship between
French and British painting during the decades of High Romanticism,
from 1820 to 1840. The profound engagement between these two previously
unsympathetic schools of painting resulted in formal and stylistic
innovations that would radically affect the course of modern art
in western Europe.
Following Napoleon Bonapartes defeat at Waterloo in 1815,
artists and educated tourists crisscrossed the English Channel.
British painters contributed regularly to the Paris art exhibitions,
and travel by French artists to England and Scotland became a common
alternative to studying in Italy. Anglomania was rampant in Paris,
with every aspect of British culture and manners eagerly absorbed
and imitated. The pictures in this exhibition have been arranged
thematically, as described in the following text, to illustrate
the rich tapestry of this entente cordiale.
Théodore Géricaults Raft of the Medusa in
The Medusa was the flagship of a convoy carrying settlers
to reestablish the French colony at Senegal. Owing to the incompetence
of its inexperienced captain, it ran aground off the west coast
of Africa on July 2, 1816. Two hundred and fifty passengers were
placed in lifeboats; the rest boarded a makeshift raft, to be towed
to safety. In their haste to get to shore, those in the boats cut
the raft loose, leaving 149 men and one woman adrift.
With few provisions and no navigational equipment on the raft,
the situation rapidly deteriorated. An attempted mutiny decimated
the ranks. By the fourth day all the survivors were practicing cannibalism.
By the eighth day, only fifteen men remained. They survived another
week until their rescue by the British frigate Argus. Among
the survivors were the ships surgeon and an engineer. Their
account of the tragedy, published in 1817, accused the French government
of a cover-up. It also inspired Théodore Géricault
to paint the supreme manifesto of Romanticism, The Raft of the
Géricault was already a preeminent figure in French art
when he embarked on this project. But presenting a controversial
topical subject, on the immense scale of 16-by-23 feet and in the
style of grand history painting, was artistically and politically
provocative. Not surprisingly, this painting divided critics when
it was shown at the 1819 Paris Salon. Depressed by its reception
in France, Géricault accepted an invitation to exhibit the
Raft in Great Britain, where the story of the infamous shipwreck
had been well publicized and was seen as a vindication of British
disdain for the French navy.
From June to December 1820, more than forty thousand British visitors
paid to see the Raft in William Bullocks Egyptian Hall,
a fashionable gallery in Piccadilly, London. The exhibition was
both a financial and a critical success. We can judge its effect
in the present exhibition by a full-scale copy painted in 1859 by
Pierre-Désiré Guillemet and Eugène Ronjat,
dramatically installed as it would have been in Bullocks establishment.
Géricaults rare and exquisite preparatory oil studies
for the Raft offer a stunning complement, together with masterpieces
by British artists that the painting inspired, including J. M. W.
Turners imposing Disaster at Sea.
While in London for his exhibition, Géricault wrote prophetically
to his friend and fellow artist Horace Vernet: "The only thing
our talent lacks is to be steeped in the English School . . . color
and effect are understood and felt only here. Each school has its
own character. If we were to succeed in uniting all their qualities,
would we not attain perfection?"