Background
Antoine-Jean Gros was born on March 16, 1771 in Paris, France. He was a son of Jean-Antoine Gros and Pierrette-Madeleine-Cécile Durand, both were miniature painters.
Paris, France
Gros attended Collège Mazarin in Paris.
Order of Saint Michael
National Order of the Legion of Honour
Paris, France
Gros attended Collège Mazarin in Paris.
Order of Saint Michael
National Order of the Legion of Honour
Antoine-Jean Gros was born on March 16, 1771 in Paris, France. He was a son of Jean-Antoine Gros and Pierrette-Madeleine-Cécile Durand, both were miniature painters.
Initially, Gros was trained by his father. In 1785, he enrolled at the studio of Jacques-Louis David, continuing at the same time to attend the classes of the Collège Mazarin.
Upon his arrival to Italy, Antoine-Jean met Empress Joséphine in Genoa, and she introduced him to Napoleonic society. Gros entered Napoleon's immediate entourage and accompanied him on several north Italian campaigns. He also became involved in Napoleon's program of confiscating Italian art for removal to France.
In 1800, Gros returned to Paris and began to show his Napoleonic paintings in the annual Salons. The most famous of these are the "Pesthouse at Jaffa" (1804) and "Napoleon at Eylau" (1808). These works served to deify Napoleon, showing him engaged in acts of heroism and mercy. Stylistically, the paintings were revolutionary: their exotic settings, rich color, agitated space and general penchant for showing the gruesome specifics of war and suffering, differed radically from the cool generalizations of Davidian classicism, that Gros had learned as a student. The presentation of contemporary historical events was also new, a harbinger of the realism, that developed steadily during the first half of the 19th century in French, American and English painting. Finally, the emphatic emotionalism of Gros's art established the foundation of romantic painting, that Théodore Géricault and Eugène Delacroix developed after him.
Unlike that of some of his countrymen, Gros's position did not suffer after the fall of Napoleon. Gros painted for the restored monarchy, for instance, "Louis XVIII Leaving the Tuileries" (1817), and he decorated the dome of the Panthéon in Paris with scenes of French history (1814-1824). But these works lack the zest and commitment of Gros's Napoleonic period, perhaps because they were not based on the immediate kinds of historical experiences, that had inspired the earlier paintings.
Although marked by considerable public success, Gros's later career was in many ways acutely troubled. Basically, he could not resolve his personal esthetic theories with his own painting or with the work of his younger contemporaries. To the end, Gros wished to propagate the classicism of David, and he took over David's studio,when the master was exiled in 1816. By the 1820, however, the revolutionary romanticism of Géricault and Delacroix, among others, had clearly begun to eclipse classicism, and Gros found himself fighting a lonely and losing battle for conservatism. Ironically, he was fighting a trend, that his own best work had helped to originate. As he persisted, moreover, his own painting began to show a mixture of classic and romantic attitudes. Thus, while he was inherently a romantic, he tragically came to doubt himself.
Also, during his lifetime, Gros served as a professor at the École des Beaux-Arts.
Gros was widely known as an author of the portrait of the French commander, Napoleon Bonaparte. The portrait brought him to the public attention and gained the patronage of Napoleon. He also produced several large paintings of battles and other events in Napoleon's life. These were mostly in a neoclassical style. Gros had also been an inspiration to Eugene Delacroix, especially with his work in lithography.
Gros was made a member of the Legion of Honour by Napoleon on October 22, 1808. Also, he was a member of the Order of Saint Michael.
In 1824, Antoine-Jean was titled as Baron Gros by King Charles X of France.
The Death of Timophanes
François I and Charles V Visiting the Church of Saint Denis
Portrait of Christine Boyer
Bonaparte Visiting the Plague Victims of Jaffa
The Battle of Nazareth 1801
Equestrian Portrait of Prince Boris Yusupov
Hercules and Diomedes
Portrait of Second Lieutenant Charles Legrand
Portrait of Madame Bruyere
Honoré Charles Baston De Lariboisière
Madame Pasteur 1796
Equestrian Portrait of Joachim Murat
Sappho at Leucate
Departure of Louis XVIII from the Palace of the Tuileries on the Night of 20 March 1815
Count Jean Antoine Chaptal
The Apotheosis of Saint Genevieve
Embarkation of Madame D'Angoulême
First Consul Bonaparte
Bonaparte at the Pont D'Arcole
Battle of Eylau, February 9, 1807
Battle of the Pyramids
Equestrian Portrait of Jérôme Bonaparte
Battle of Aboukir, July 25, 1799
Portrait of the French Composer Pierre Zimmermann
The Horse of Mustapha Pasha
General Baston De Lariboisière and His Son Ferdinand
Portrait of General Claude Legrand
Napoleon Accepts the Surrender of Madrid, 4 December 1808
Antoine-Jean Gros was a member of Académie des Beaux-Arts.
