Pierre-Nolasque Bergeret

Pierre-Nolasque Bergeret (30 January 1782 — 21 February 1863) was a French painter, pioneer lithographer and designer who studied with Jacques-Louis David.

He was born in Bordeaux, where he received his early training, then moved to Paris, where he worked in the ateliers of François André Vincent and then David, where he met François-Marius Granet and Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres. [A copy, thought to be Bergeret's, of Ingres' "Titian Painting François I" is conserved at the Musée Crozatier, Le Puy-en-Velay.( [http://www.culture.gouv.fr/public/mistral/joconde_fr?ACTION=CHERCHER&FIELD_98=AUTR&VALUE_98=BERGERET%20Pierre%20Nolasque&DOM=All&REL_SPECIFIC=1 Ministère de la Culture] ) ] Bergeret played a major role in introducing lithography, in part through his reproductive prints after paintings by Nicolas Poussin and Raphael: his lithograph "Mercury" (1804), reproducing a detail from Raphael’s fresco in the Villa Farnesina, and his caricature of current Paris fashion, "Le Suprême Bon Ton Actuel" (by 1805) [ [http://www.nypl.org/research/chss/spe/art/print/collections/avery/bergeret.htm (New York Public Library) Illustration.] ] are among the earliest examples of lithographic technique. [Dominique H Vasseur, 1976. "Early Lithography in France"; Vasseur, 1982. "The lithographs of Pierre-Nolasque Bergeret" exhibition catalogue, Dayton Art Institute, Dayton, Ohio, January 7-February 28, 1982.]

Bergeret was commissioned to design Napoleonic medals, or provide frieze-like panels "en camaïeu" to be painted on Sèvres porcelains [His preparatory drawing for an "Allegory of the Battle of Austerlitz" is conserved at the Musée National de Ceramique, Sèvres ( [http://www.repro-tableaux.com/a/bergeret-pierre-nolasque/allegory-of-the-battle-of-1.html Illustration] ).] and to provide designs for the bas-reliefs on the Column in the Place Vendôme, built 1806–11 in direct competition with Trajan's Column in Rome. The Column has had a checkered career, destroyed and replaced twice.

The subjects of his paintings tend towards the vividly anecdotal. He was early among artists drawing subject matter from the culture of the Renaissance, in the "style Troubadour": "Honors Rendered to Raphael on His Deathbed" 1806 (Allen Art Museum, Oberlin College, Ohio). [ [http://www.oberlin.edu/amam/Bergeret_RaphaelonDeathbed.htm Illustration] ;] "Charles V Picking up Titian's Brush" 1808; "Anne Boleyn Condemned to Death" ca. 1814 (Musée du Louvre); "Aretino in the Studio of Titian" ca 1822; [ [http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/b/bergeret/index.html Illustration.] ] "Fra Lippo Lippi Enslaved in Tangiers, Painting a Portrait of His Captor" ca 1819; [ [http://www.frenchdrawings.org/highlights.php?owner=0&vol=21&vl=26&vo=0&dwg=877 Preparatory drawing] .] Other typical subjects are propagandistic allegories and representations of current events of the French Empire.

He died in Paris.

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External links

* [http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/bergeret_pierre-nolasque.html Pierre-Nolasque Bergeret on-line]