Category: French painters

Comtesse d’Haussonville by Ingres (1845)

Comtesse d'Haussonville by Ingres (1845)

Ingres, or to give him his full name, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, a French Neoclassical painter was born in Montauban in 1780.   Ingres after spending some time in Italy returned to Paris in 1834.  It was at this time that he began to earn the reputation of being  a great portrait artist.  His greatest paintings were his portraits, which were both painted and drawn.  He is looked upon now as one who embodied the Romantic spirit of his time.

Today’s painting is Louis de Broglie, Countesse d’Haussonville which Ingres painted in 1845 and I was fortunate to see it when I visited the Frick Collection in New York some years ago.  Ingres had the ability of expressing the beauty of his subject, none more so than this portrait of the Comtesse d’Haussonville who, despite her reserved and somewhat prim appearance, was an outspoken liberal, author and well regarded intellectual.  Note the luxurious opulent folds of her silk dress and the lustre of her red hair ribbon.

The Red Roofs by Camille Pissarro (1877)

The Red Roofs by Camille Pissaro (1877)

Camille Pissarro, the Impressionist painter of French descent, was born in 1830 on the island of St Thomas in the Danish West Indies.  At the age of twelve he went to Europe where he attended a Paris boarding school.  During his time in Paris he studied at various academic institutions including the École des Beaux Arts and Académie Suisse and under a succession of masters such as Corot and Courbet.  In the 1860’s he, along with Monet, became involved in the Impressionist Movement and spent most of his time painting urban and rural pictures which illustrated French life of that era, particularly in the area around Pontoise.  Pissarro died in Paris in November 1903 and was buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery, Paris.

Painted in 1877, today’s painting is entitled The Red Roofs and is a small (55 x 85cms) oil on canvas picture which hangs in the Musée d’Orsay.  The location for this painting is a group of farm buildings called La Côte des Boeufs, near Pontoise.   The painting is complicated by the fact that the artist wanted to show the buildings as seen through the trees but the screen of trees makes us look quickly beyond the trees, into the heart of the painting, and by doing so one can differentiate the many layers of colour.