Question:  Can you provide information on the painter De La Croix, the French
painter?


Answer From:   Teachbug


Delacroix was born on April 26, 1798, at Charenton-St. Maurice, and was
educated at the imperial lycEe, where he studied under the French painter
Pierre Guerin (1774-1833). He was trained in the formal neoclassical style of
the French painter Jacques Louis David, but he was strongly influenced by the
more colorful, opulent style of such earlier masters as the Flemish painter
Peter Paul Rubens and the Italian painter Paolo Veronese. He also absorbed
the spirit of his contemporary and countryman Theodore Gericault, whose early
works exemplify the violent action, love of liberty, and budding romanticism
of the turbulent post-Napoleonic period.

Delacroix's artistic career began in 1822, when his first painting was
accepted by the Paris Salon. He achieved popular success in 1824 with
Massacre at Chios  (Louvre, Paris), which portrays the topical and heroic
subject of the Greek struggle for independence. On a trip to England in 1825,
he studied the work of English painters. The influence of R. P. Bonington,
who painted in bright, jewel-like colors, is evident in Delacroix's
subsequent works, such as Death of Sardanapalus  (1827, Louvre). A
full-fledged work of his mature style, it is a lavish, violent, colorful
canvas in which women, slaves, animals, jewels, and fabrics are combined with
almost equal emphasis in a swirling, almost delirious composition.

Delacroix's most overtly romantic and perhaps most influential work is
Liberty Leading the People  (1830, Louvre), a semi-allegorical glorification
of the idea of liberty. This painting confirmed the clear division between
the romantic style of painting, which emphasized color and spirit, and the
concurrent neoclassical style (headed by the French painter J. A. D. Ingres),
which emphasized line and cool detachment.

Delacroix remained the dominant French romantic painter throughout his life.
A trip to North Africa in 1832 provided subjects for more than 100 sensuous
canvases. In addition, he received many government commissions for murals and
ceiling paintings. Many of his late works, especially animal pictures, hunt
scenes, and marine subjects, are superb, but others exhibit a certain dryness
of execution and lack of inspiration. He also illustrated various works of
Shakespeare, the Scottish writer Sir Walter Scott, and the German writer
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

Delacroix's technique, in which he applied contrasting colors with small
strokes of the brush, creating a particularly vibrant effect, was an
important influence on the impressionists. He is also well known for his
Journals,  which display considerable literary talent and express his views
on art, politics, and life. Delacroix died in Paris on August 13, 1863.