Lagrenée's illustrious career began with his award of the Prix de Rome in 1749 and ended with his appointment as curator of the new national museums of France in 1804. He practiced a decorative, yet polished, classicizing style reminiscent of seventeenth-century artists such as Guido Reni and Eustace de la Sueur. This painting provides an excellent example of the artist's work in which the subject is treated in strong colors, with a smooth, refined technique. Alcibiades, an Athenian general, suffers his mistress's rejection for defeating only nine of the ten warriors he met in battle. He was defeated by the tenth.
Details
- Artist Name: Louis Jean François Lagrenée (French, 1725-1805)
- Title: Alcibiades on His Knees Before His Mistress
- Date: c.1781
- Medium: Oil on panel
- Dimensions: 20-3/4 x 25-1/2 in. (52.7 x 64.8 cm)
- Credit Line: Norton Simon Art Foundation
- Accession Number: M.1977.26.2.P
- Copyright: © Norton Simon Art Foundation
Object Information
[S.O.C.O.T.A. (Société pour le Commerce des Tableaux), Geneva; consigned to];
[Heim Gallery, Ltd., London, sold 1977 to];
Norton Simon Art Foundation.
Salon
- Paris, Salon, 1781 to 1781
Aspects of French Academic Art 1680-1780
- London, Heim Gallery, 1977-06-10 to 1977-08-26
[on loan]
- Henry Art Gallery, 1977-12-30 to 1978-10-04
- Bachaumont, Louis Petit de, Mémoires secrets, 1783, p. 359
- Goncourt, Edmond de, L'Art, 1877, p. 237
- Diderot, Salons, 1979, pp. 310-311, 354
- Campbell, Sara, Collector Without Walls: Norton Simon and His Hunt for the Best, 2010, cat. 1462 p. 409
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