A massive exhibition celebrating the bicentenary of Jacques Louis-David, whose paintings chronicled the French Revolution and Napoleonic era in real time, opened at the Louvre in Paris.
An arch neo-classicist, David’s tortuous career progression tracked political developments in France: The recipient of a Louvre studio from Louis XVI, David would go on to paint the defining images of revolution in The Tennis Court Oath and The Death of Marat, and later became “First Painter to the Emperor” under Napoleon Bonaparte, after escaping the guillotine (unlike his friend Maximilien Robespierre).
Though his political opportunism is perhaps not personally admirable, David “brought painting thrillingly to a crossroads with politics,” the Financial Times wrote, “and his life … is necessarily fascinating.”