6/22/2016 (2) David, The Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries | Neo-Classicism | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe …
David, The Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries
Essay by Dr. Bryan Zygmont .
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At the beginning of the movie The Godfather, Michael Corleone (played by Al
Pacino) wants nothing to do with his family’s involvement in organized crime.
When telling a family story to his girlfriend, he concludes, “That’s my family,
Kay, That’s not me.” As the film progresses, however, Michael’s father and
older brother are the focus of violent attacks and Michael becomes more
active in the family business until—at the end of the film—he has assumed
the leadership of the Corleone crime syndicate by killing all of his enemies.
Fictional characters—both in film and in novels—have arcs. They change
through time. The same is true of real characters from history. They often
have a rise, but just as often there is a precipitous fall. Napoleon Bonaparte is
but one example.
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6/22/2016 (2) David, The Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries | Neo-Classicism | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe …
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, Napoleon I on his Imperial Throne,
1806, oil on canvas, 259 x 162 cm (Musée de l’Armée, Hôtel des
Invalides, Paris)
A visual starting point could be Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres’s 1806
painting, Napoleon on His Imperial Throne(above). In this work, Ingres
painted Napoleon as if he were an omnipotent ruler—rather than a mere
mortal. But six years later, Jacques-Louis David (Ingres’s former teacher),
painted The Emperor Napoleon in His Study in the Tulieries (1812). These
two portraits—painted just six years apart—show a significant arc in the life
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6/22/2016 (2) David, The Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries | Neo-Classicism | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe …
and career of Napoleon.
Alexander Hamilton, the Tenth Duke of
Hamilton (and sadly, of no relationship to the
de facto leader of the Federalist Party in the
United States with whom he shares a name)
commissioned David to paint The Emperor
Napoleon in His Study in the Tulieries in
1811.
Finished the following year, it shows a
standing Napoleon, about three-quarters lifesized. He slightly turns his face to look at the
viewer, and his right hand is tucked into his
Jacques-Louis David, The Emperor
Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries,
1812, oil on canvas, 203.9 x 125.1 cm
(National Gallery of Art)
uniform jacket (to this day, some jackets
often have a vertically zippered pocket on
the left side; this is called a Napoleon
pocket).
The blue jacket with the white facing and red
upturned cuffs and the gold epaulettes identify him as a colonel in the
Imperial Guard Foot Grenadiers—a group of elite soldiers that Napoleon
personally commanded. The two medals pinned to Napoleon’s left breast
speak to the scope of his rule. The leftmost of the two is the Order of the Iron
Crown, an organization Napoleon founded in 1805 as the King of Italy. The
second medal is that of the French Legion of Honor.
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6/22/2016 (2) David, The Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries | Neo-Classicism | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe …
Napoleon (detail), Jacques-Louis David, The Emperor Napoleon in his
Study at the Tuileries, 1812, oil on canvas, 203.9 x 125.1 cm (National
Gallery of Art)
Napoleon’s uniform is completed with white knee breeches and stockings,
and black shoes with gold buckles. Although he wears a military uniform, this
is hardly a military portrait. He has discarded his officer’s sword—it rests on
the chair on the right side of the painting—and Napoleon is shown doing the
administrative work of a civic leader. He stands between the high-backed red
velvet chair on the right and in front of the Empire-styled desk behind him. A
gilded regal lion serves as the visible leg of the desk, and an ink-stained quill,
candle-lit lamp, and various papers can be seen atop his writing table.
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6/22/2016 (2) David, The Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries | Neo-Classicism | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe …
Desk and chair (detail), Jacques-Louis David, The Emperor Napoleon in
his Study at the Tuileries, 1812, oil on canvas, 203.9 x 125.1 cm
(National Gallery of Art)
A rolled up sheet of paper with the letters
COD can be seen on the right side of the
desk. This detail alludes to the Napoleonic
Code—the French civil law code Napoleon
established in 1804. The bees, which
resemble an upside-downfleurs-de-lys, can
Fleur de lis (left) and the bee
be seen in the velvet that covers the chair
(both the bee and the fleur de lys were
symbols of the French monarchy).
David has signed and dated the portrait on a rolled up map to the side of the
table, a leather-bound volume of Plutarch (in French: Plutarque) is beside it.
Plutarch was an ancient Roman biographer and historian, most famous in the
nineteenth century as the author of The Parallel Lives, a text that explores the
virtues and vices of Greek and Roman rulers, men such as Alexander the
Great, Themistocles, Julius Caesar, and Cicero. The inclusion of this book
was a way to visually tie Napoleon to the great rulers of the classical past
who he so admired. And yet, not everything is perfect within this space.
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6/22/2016 (2) David, The Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries | Neo-Classicism | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe …
Signature and book by Plutarch (detail), Jacques-Louis David, The
Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries, 1812, oil on canvas,
203.9 x 125.1 cm (National Gallery of Art)
Although Napoleon stands and looks out towards the viewer, he looks more
disheveled than not. His hair—complete with the gray typical of a man in his
50s—appears unkempt and tousled. In addition, his uniform would hardly
pass muster. A cuff button has been undone, and his silken stockings and
trousers appear wrinkled from being worn for an exceptionally long working
day. This fact is alluded to by two time-bearing details. The grandfather clock
displays the time as 4:12. And the candles of his desk lamp—one nearly
burned to its completing, another recently extinguished, several others
seemingly expired—make it clear that it is not the late afternoon, but rather
the very early morning. Clearly, time was running short.
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6/22/2016 (2) David, The Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries | Neo-Classicism | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe …
Left: undone cuff; right: candles (details), Jacques-Louis David, The
Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries, 1812, oil on canvas,
203.9 x 125.1 cm (National Gallery of Art)
This portrait seems to suggest that Napoleon
was working too late and too hard at the time
it was commissioned, and indeed,
Napoleon’s time as a world ruler was coming
to a climactic finale. The year the painting
was completed—1812—was a particularly
calamitous one for Napoleon, as he was in
the middle of the disastrous invasion of
Russia. Less than two years later, on 4 April
1814, Napoleon abdicated his throne and
was exiled to the island of Elba. David
skillfully and subtly depicts Napoleon’s
transition from omnipotent ruler to fallible
commander. In this regards, David’s portrait
can be seen as a painted contemporary
version of the Greek sculptor Glykon’s
Glykon, Weary Hercules, bronze, 3rd
statue, The Weary Hercules, a small bronze
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6/22/2016 (2) David, The Emperor Napoleon in his Study at the Tuileries | Neo-Classicism | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe | Baroque to Neoclassical art in Europe …
century B.C.E. or later Roman copy
(Louvre)
copy that David likely saw in the Louvre. Like
the mighty Hercules, Napoleon had once
been an all-powerful leader. But as Hercules
had his downfall at the hands of his jealous wife Deianara, so too did
Napoleon have his downfall at the hands of the Duke of Wellington. A failed
return to power in 1815 caused Napoleon’s permanent banishment to the
island of Saint Helena where he died in 1821. David’s portrait of the ruler in
his study, thus constitutes one of the last formal portraits of the great French
ruler.
Essay by Dr. Bryan Zygmont
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