Georges Rochegrosse

Georges Rochegrosse
Georges Rochegrosse. Self-portrait, 1908
Born	Georges-Antoine-Marie Rochegrosse 2 August 1859 Versailles, France
Died	11 July 1938(1938-07-11) (aged 78) El Biar, Algeria
Resting place	Montparnasse Cemetery
Education	Jules Joseph Lefebvre and Gustave Boulanger in Paris
Known for	Painter, illustrator, poster artist, and etcher
Movement	Orientalist
Spouse	Marie Leblond
Awards	Officer of the Legion of Honor (1892)

Georges Antoine Rochegrosse (French: [ʒɔʁʒ ɑ̃twan ʁɔʃɡʁɔs]; 2 August 1859 – 11 July 1938) was a French historical and decorative painter.

Life and career

He was born in Versailles and studied in Paris with Jules Joseph Lefebvre and Gustave Clarence Rodolphe Boulanger. His themes are generally historical, and he treated them on a colossal scale and in an emotional naturalistic style, with a distinct revelling in horrible subjects and details.

He made his Paris Salon début in 1882 with Vitellius traîné dans les rues de Rome par la populace (Vitellius dragged through the streets of Rome by the people) (1882; Sens). He followed this the year afterwards with Andromaque (1882–83; Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen), which won that year's prestigious Prix du Salon. There followed La Jacquerie (1885; Untraced), La mort de Babylone (The fall of Babylon) (1891; Untraced), The death of the Emperor Geta (1899; Musée de Picardie, Amiens), and Barbarian ambassadors at the Court of Justinian (1907; Untraced), all of which exemplify his strong and spirited but sensational and often brutal painting. In quite another style and beautiful in colour is his Le Chevalier aux Fleurs (The Knight of Flowers) (1894; Musée d’Orsay, Paris; RF 898).

He was elected an Officer of the Legion of Honour in 1892 and received the Medal of Honour in 1906 for The Red Delight. Rochegrosse also illustrated several books. His great love, his wife Marie Rochegrosse (née Leblond), had died in 1920. He lived his final years in El Biar, in Algeria, where he died. He is buried in Paris, in the Montparnasse Cemetery, near the poet Theodore de Banville, his stepfather.

Selected works

Paintings

• 
  Greek troops rushing forward at the Battle of Marathon
• 
  The Knight of the Flowers
• 
  Marie Rochegrosse in the Dining Room
• 
  Portrait of Sarah Bernhardt
  in Costume
• 
  Vitellius
  Dragged Through the Streets of Rome by the Populace

Posters

• 
  Poster for Gustave Charpentier's Louise (1900)
• 
  Phototype reproduction of Rochegrosse's art used in the poster for the première of Claude Debussy and Maurice Maeterlinck's Pelléas et Mélisande (1902)
• 
  Poster for
  Don Quichotte (1910)
  by Jules Massenet
• 
  Poster for the Paris première of Pénélope (1913)

Sources

•  Gilman, D. C.; Peck, H. T.; Colby, F. M., eds. (1905). "Rochegrosse". New International Encyclopedia (1st ed.). New York: Dodd, Mead.

External links

• Media related to Georges-Antoine Rochegrosse at Wikimedia Commons