A French dream - From the Academy to the Salons, the 19th century Fine Arts in Paris

VISUAL ARTS
CROISEMENTS FESTIVAL 2018
PAINTING

Selected Works from Cnap and ENSBA

Inspired by the European Enlightenment, 19th century French artists resisted the luxurious Rococo style favored by the aristocracy and embraced the art of Greece and Rome in antiquity. The aim was to improve morality and to advocate Republic ideologies through reviving the styles and spirits of the classical tradition.

The French Academy of Arts and the salons at the time served as creative platforms which allowed different styles of artistic movements such as Neoclassicism, Romanticism and Realism to flourish, and in turn enabling arts to play a part in social reform and modernization. As a result, France witnessed an all-round prosperity of arts and became the world art center in the 19th century.

The exhibition focuses on the artworks created in France during the period from the French Revolution to the First World War, with Paris at its center. The 103 pieces of exhibited works come from the world-renowned ENSBA and CNAP, including masterpieces by artists such as Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, William-Adolphe Bouguereau and Pascal Adolphe Jean Dagnan-Bouveret. It also includes sculptures by François Rude who created the bas-relief of Marseillaise on the Arch of Triumph in Paris. The three oil paintings by Ingres, including Jupiter and Thetis, are particularly noteworthy.

This exhibition will offer visitors a vision of creativity and vitality from the 19th and 20th century France.

About the Parisian Salons
The Parisian Salons were a great creativity booster at the time. It welcomed visitors and artists from all kind of nationalities. The Salons allowed every big artistic movements of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century to flourish, to spread and reach out a wide audience: neoclassicism, romantism, realism, naturalism.