Horace Vernet was a French painter, lithographer, and draughtsman often associated with the Orientalist movement. He also executed portraits, paintings of historical subjects, and battle scenes, which produced some of his best-known artworks today, such as The Last Grenadier of Waterloo and Napoleonic battle in the Alps.
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Horace Vernet
Horace Vernet was a French painter, lithographer, and draughtsman often associated with the Orientalist movement. He also executed portraits, paintings of historical subjects, and battle scenes, which produced some of his best-known artworks today, such as The Last Grenadier of Waterloo and Napoleonic battle in the Alps.
Early Life and the Vernet Family
Horace Vernet was born in June 1789, in Paris, France. From the very beginning, his life was surrounded by art. His father was Carle Vernet, a very famous painter, and his grandfather Claude-Joseph Vernet was an artist as well. While Claude-Joseph was known for his breathtaking landscapes and marines, Carle was a successful genre painter and also worked with printmaking.
His mother was named Catherine François and was the daughter of Jean-Michel Moreau, a French draughtsman and illustrator. The artistic network already established by his family was extremely beneficial for Horace later in his life. Curiously, Horace Vernet was born at the Louvre Museum, where his parents stayed during the French Revolution. It was on the day before the Storming of the Bastille. At the end of that same year, his grandfather died.
The following years weren't easy for Vernet's family. When he was only three, Horace, his sister, and his parents fled the Louvre under gunfire. In 1794, Madame Marguerite, Carle Vernet's sister, was executed on the charges of stealing from a castle. Carle Vernet pleaded for Jacques-Louis David's help to no avail.
Artistic Education
The first documentation of Horace Vernet's career was when he tried to participate in the Prix de Rome at 20 years old. He was trained by the Neo-Classical painter François-Andre Vincent, who was a friend of his father. In 1810, he met Louise Pujol at a salon, and they married the same year.
The painter developed a disdain for French art influenced by Classicism and its high-minded seriousness. Vernet began to focus mostly on subjects depicting contemporary French life. During his early career, when Napoleon Bonaparte was still in power, Vernet decided to represent the French soldier in a more vernacular, familiar manner, different from Jacques-Louis David's idealized perception.
Despite Vernet's failure in winning the Prix de Rome, in 1811, he received his first commission. It was a portrait of Jérôme Bonaparte, Napoleon's younger brother. He was so satisfied with the painting that he commissioned a battle scene, which became a running motif on the painter's work. That same painting was among the selection of artworks from his first participation in a Salon, where he won a medal.
The piece Taking of an Entrenched Camp is a work that already shows a very keen character. Other artworks that follow the same style depicting soldiers in a less idealizing tone include The Dog of the Regiment Wounded, Death of Poniatowski, and The Wounded Trumpeter.
The Fall of the Empire
In 1812, Napoleon had a failed attempt to invade Russia. Two years later, while returning from this campaign, the Battle of Paris took place. Many countries formed a coalition, like Austria, Russia, and Prussia, among others. They fought against the French Empire, invading the capital and forcing the Emperor to retreat and exile himself. Vernet depicted The Battle of Paris in the painting The Gate at Clichy.
Horace Vernet participated in the battle as a National Guard, also known as the Republican Guard in France, a militia created by the Emperor in 1802. The National Guard still acts today, functioning to protect the State and keep Paris safe. The image of the soldier is something that Horace projected throughout his entire career and served as a personal experience to understand their regiments, routines, and organization.
Inspiration Abroad
In the early Restoration, Vernet decided to travel across Europe, visiting Belgium, England, and Italy. Horace was fascinated by the street carnival in Italy. The painter even portrayed a horse race based on one he had seen at the Italian event. The artwork participated in the Salon of 1824 but is now lost. Those trips were deeply valued by the artist, who sometimes had Théodore Gericault as his companion.
Back to Paris
After returning to his country, Vernet kept his social circles. He used to be in the company of soldiers and Bonapartists, people who weren't satisfied with the Restoration of the Monarchy. His atelier became a meeting place for the ones that didn't align with the direction of the government.
These political ties resulted in the censorship of two works he submitted for the Salon of 1822, as they portrayed revolutionary imagery. Taking advantage of the situation, the artist threw a publicity stunt: he organized an exhibition with the two paintings that weren't accepted along with the other fifty works, attracting noteworthy attention from the public and the media.
Even though he had this early conflict with the government, Vernet achieved considerable recognition during the Bourbon Restoration. This period was following Napoleon's downfall and lasted until the July Revolution. Said notoriety would come thanks to a series of battle paintings commissioned by the future King Louis-Philippe and the Duc d'Orleans. In 1825, Vernet was awarded the Legion of Honor and later became part of the Academy.
Later Years and Death
During the Second Empire, Vernet continued to paint heroic depictions of the French Army. During the Crimean War, the artist accompanied the French Army campaign and executed several paintings of battle scenes, such as one representing the Battle of the Alma. This piece was met with a lukewarm reception, as opposed to his previous production.
A running anecdote states that upon a request to erase a particular general from one of his compositions, the artist firmly replied, "I am a painter of history, sire, and I will not violate the truth," which demonstrates his commitment to depicting the war with precision. Horace Vernet died in 1863 in his hometown, Paris.
A curious fact, in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's novel Sherlock Holmes, there is the story The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter that tells how the famous detective claimed to be related to Vernet, stating that his grandmother was the artist's sister.
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