Jean-Joseph Taillasson

Jean-Joseph Taillasson (Blaye, near Bordeaux, [John Denison Champlin, Charles Callahan Perkins, "Cyclopedia of Painters and Paintings" (1887) "s.v." "Taillasson, Jean Joseph".] 6 July 1745 — Paris, 11 November 1809 ["Cyclopedia".] ) was a French history painter and portraitist, draftsman and art critic, [His poem "Le Danger des règles dans les Arts" was noted with approval by the Danish visitor to Paris, Tønnes Christian Bruun-Neergaard, and an elegy "Sur la Nuit", he thought, seemed fit to soften the least sensitive heart. (Bruun-Neergaard, ""Sur la situation des beaux arts en France: ou lettres d'un Danois a son ami" (pp. 140-41, under the date 12 germinal an 9 [3 April 1802] ). ] who matured his talent in the Paris ateliers of Joseph-Marie Vien (from 1764) ["Taillasson , très-bon compositeur" remarked Bruun-Neergaard.] and Nicolas Bernard Lépicié and, having won third place in the Prix de Rome competition, 1769, spent four years, 1773-77, in Italy. At his return to Paris he set an early example of neoclassicism.

His "Observations sur quelques grands peintres", [Full title, "Observations sur quelques grands peintres, dans lesquelles on cherche à fixer les caractères distinctifs de leur talent, avec un précis de leur Vie"] (Paris, Duminil-Lesueur) 1807, offered anti-academic advice somewhat at variance with his own manner; some of the collected observations had previously appeared in the "Journal des Arts" [Remarked on by Bruun-Neergaard; see also Debra Schrishuhn, "The Observations Of Jean-Joseph Taillasson: Anti-Academic Admonitions From A Seasoned Academician" "Proceedings Of The Consortium On Revolutionary Europe"(1997:651-58).]

elected works

* "Self Portrait", Musée du Louvre
* "Jeune Homme, vêtu d'une robe, levant les bras", Musée du Louvre
* "La Nymphe surprise", Musée des Augustins, Toulouse
* "Timoléon à qui les Syracusiens amènent des étrangers", Musée Ingres, Montauban; another version is at the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Tours.
* "Un Vieillard, assis, lisant", Musée du Louvre
* "Vieillard drapé, debout, vu de dos", Musée du Louvre.
* "Claude-Louis, comte de Saint-Germain (1707-1778)", 1777 Musée national de Versailles
* "La Naissance de Louis XIII", 1782 Musée des Beaux-Arts, Pau
* "La Madeleine au désert", 1784 Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
* "Ulysse et Néoptolème enlevant à Philoctète les flèches d'Hercule", 1784 Musée des Beaux-Arts, Bordeaux; this was his "morceau de reception" at the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture.
* "Sabinus et Eponina découverts par les soldats de Vespasien" 1787 ["Cyclopedia"]
* "Virgil reading the 'Aeneid' to Augustus and Octavia", 1787 (National Gallery, London)
* "Léandre et Héro", 1789 Musée des Beaux-Arts, Bordeaux
* "Seigneur! Voyez ces yeux" (Cleopatra of Syria is discovered by Rodogune to have poisoned the nuptial cup, a scene from Pierre Corneille's "Rodogune" (1644), 1791 Boston Museum of Fine Arts; Tønnes Christian Bruun-Neergaard considered that it had established the painter's reputation, and remarked that it had belonged to "Citoyen" Godefroy, a well-known amateur, who auction dsaletranspired in 1794. [Bruun-Neergaard 1802:141.]
* "Pauline, femme de Sénèque, rappelée à la vie", 1791 Musée du Louvre
* "Olympias", 1799 ["Cyclopedia"]
* "Andromache", 1800 ["Cyclopedia"]
* "Rhadamate et Zénobie", 1806 ["Cyclopedia"]
* "Spring (or Flora) leading Cupid back to Nature" (Bowes Museum, County Durham, UK)

Notes