{
"data": {
"id": 147526,
"accession_number": "1973.36",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "The Prisoner, c. 1816\u201322. Jacques-Louis David (French, 1748\u20131825). Black chalk on cream laid paper; sheet: 13.1 x 19.6 cm (5 3/16 x 7 11/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund, 1973.36",
"current_location": null,
"title": "The Prisoner",
"creation_date": "c. 1816\u201322",
"creation_date_earliest": 1816,
"creation_date_latest": 1822,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"France, 19th century"
],
"technique": "black chalk on cream laid paper",
"support_materials": [
{
"description": "cream(3) laid paper",
"watermarks": []
}
],
"department": "Drawings",
"collection": "DR - French",
"type": "Drawing",
"measurements": "Sheet: 13.1 x 19.6 cm (5 3/16 x 7 11/16 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"sheet": {
"height": 0.131,
"height_inch": 5,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.1875,
"width": 0.196,
"width_inch": 7,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.6875
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "inscribed, at upper left, in black chalk: L. David, Brux.; inscribed, on an old support, now removed: 1 des. de L. David.",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 301878,
"title": "Year in Review: 1973",
"description": "Year in Review: 1973. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 30-March 17, 1974).",
"opening_date": "1974-01-30T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 309654,
"title": "The Lessons of the Academy",
"description": "The Lessons of the Academy. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 8-May 29, 1983).",
"opening_date": "1983-02-08T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 311734,
"title": "Treasures on Paper",
"description": "Treasures on Paper. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 10-July 24, 1988).",
"opening_date": "1988-05-10T04:00:00"
},
{
"id": 441416,
"title": "Jacques-Louis David",
"description": "Jacques-Louis David. Mus\u00e9e du Louvre, Paris, France (October 26, 1988-February 12, 1989); Mus\u00e9e National de Ch\u00e2teau de Versailles, 78 008 Versailles cedex, France (October 26, 1988-February 12, 1989).",
"opening_date": "1989-10-26T04:00:00"
},
{
"id": 311467,
"title": "Directions in Drawing II: The Human Figure",
"description": "Directions in Drawing II: The Human Figure. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 5, 1991-January 12, 1992).",
"opening_date": "1991-11-05T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 311635,
"title": "French Drawings from the Collection",
"description": "French Drawings from the Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 13, 1994-March 12, 1995).",
"opening_date": "1994-12-13T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 223677,
"title": "Jacques-Louis David: Empire to Exile",
"description": "Jacques-Louis David: Empire to Exile. J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA (February 1-April 24, 2005); Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA (organizer) (June 5-September 5, 2005).",
"opening_date": "2005-02-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"id": 361567,
"title": "Jacques Louis David: Radical Draftsman",
"description": "Jacques Louis David: Radical Draftsman. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY (organizer) (February 14-May 15, 2022) https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/listings/2022/jacques-louis-david-radical-draftsman.",
"opening_date": "2022-02-17T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 324628,
"title": "Nineteenth-Century French Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art",
"description": "Nineteenth-Century French Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 20-June 11, 2023).",
"opening_date": "2023-01-19T05:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "Old Master Drawings Presented by Adolphe Stein and Lorna Lowe. H. Terry-Engell Gallery, London (July 3 - 15, 1972).",
"opening_date": "1972-07-03T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "(sale, H\u00f4tel Drouot, Paris, February 9, 1972, no. 13 bis, sold to Adolphe Stein, Paris and London)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1972",
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"description": "(Adolphe Stein, Paris and London, sold to Eugene V. Thaw, New York)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1972",
"sortorder": 2
},
{
"description": "(Eugene V. Thaw, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1972 - 1973",
"sortorder": 3
},
{
"description": "Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1973-",
"sortorder": 4
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": "Scholars have suggested that Jacques-Louis David might have intended this drawing as a portrait of Napoleon Bonaparte, who the artist supported. The former leader died a prisoner on the island of Saint Helena in 1821.",
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "This drawing belongs to a series of enigmatic sheets that the French artist Jacques-Louis David created while living as an exile in Brussels from 1816 until his death in 1825. Many of these untitled works present close-up views of expressive heads and were given by the artist to his friends. This image of a turbaned man next to a hanging chain and oil lamp loosely references David's painting The Intercession of Saint Roch (1780) from much earlier in his career.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q79926754"
],
"internet_archive": [
"https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1973.36-the-prisoner"
]
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Se\u0301rullaz, Arlette. \u201cA propos de quelques dessins de Jacques-Louis David pour \u2018Mars d\u00e9sarm\u00e9\u0301 par Ve\u0301nus et les Gr\u00e2ces.\u2019\u201d Bulletin des muse\u0301es royaux des beaux-arts de Belgique 21, nos. 1\u20134 (1972): 107-116.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 107n2",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Dessins, aquarelles, pastels, gouaches [. . .] tableaux anciens et du XIXe si\u00e8cle. Paris: H\u00f4tel Drouot, 1972.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: no. 13 bis",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Old Master Drawings Presented by Adolphe Stein and Lorna Lowe. Exh. Cat. London: H. Terry-Engell Gallery, 1972.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 9, no. 74",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Nash, Steven A. \u201cThe Drawings of Jacques-Louis David: Selected Problems.\u201d PhD diss., Stanford University, 1973.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 241, n. 439",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Lee, Sherman E. \"The Year in Review for 1973.\" Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 61, no. 2 (February 1974): 31-78.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 75, no. 65; Reproduced: p. 46",
"url": "https://www.jstor.org/stable/25152513"
},
{
"citation": "\u201cAnnual Report for 1973.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 61, no. 6 (June 1974): 179\u2013213.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 188",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25152530"
},
{
"citation": "Coekelberghs, Denis and Pierre Loze. Autour du n\u00e9o-classicisme en belgique, 1770\u20131830. Exh. cat. Brussels: Muse\u0301e Communal des Beaux-Arts d\u2019Ixelles, 1985.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: pp. 28, 189, no. 148",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Schnapper, Antoine and Arlette S\u00e9rullaz. Jacques-Louis David, 1748\u20131825. Exh. cat. Paris: Muse\u0301e du Louvre, 1989.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 106, no. 245; Reproduced: p. 554",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Noe\u0308l, Bernard. David. New York: Crown, 1989.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 48",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Johnson, Dorothy. Jacques-Louis David: Art in Metamorphosis. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: pp. 231-33; Reproduced: p. 232",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Johnson, Dorothy. Jacques-Louis David: The Farewell of Telemachus and Eucharis.. Los Angeles: Getty Museum, 1997.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: pp. 30-31; Reproduced: p. 30",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Lajer-Burcharth, Ewa. Necklines: The Art of Jacques-Louis David after the Terror. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 324, n. 94",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Rosenberg, Pierre and Louis-Antoine Prat. Jacques-Louis David, 1748\u20131825: Catalogue raisonn\u00e9 des dessins. Milan: Leonardo Arte, 2002.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: vol. 1, p. 352, no. 393",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Bordes, Philippe. Jacques-Louis David: Empire to Exile. Exh. cat. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 2005.",
"page_number": "Mentioend: p. 284, no. 43; Reproduced: p. 285",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Johnson, Dorothy. \u201cLines of Thought: David\u2019s Aporetic Late Drawings.\". In David after David, edited by Mark Ledbury. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 2007.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 160",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Padiyar, Satish. \u201cDispossessed: On \u2018Late\u2019 David.\" In David after David, edited by Mark Ledbury. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 2007.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 310",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Prat, Louis-Antoine. Le Dessin fran\u00e7ais au XIXe si\u00e8cle. Paris: Louvre Editions, 2012.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 65",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Crow, Thomas E. Restoration: The Fall of Napoleon in the Course of European Art, 1812\u20131820. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2018.",
"page_number": "Reproduced and mentioned: p. 139",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "David, Jacques Louis, and Perrin Stein. Jacques Louis David: Radical Draftsman. 2022, 253.",
"page_number": "Reproduced; p. 253, No. 81.",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Stein, Perrin. Jacques-Louis David: Radical Draftsman. Exh. cat. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2022.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: pp. 253, no. 81, 258",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Salsbury, Britany. Nineteenth-Century French Drawings: The Cleveland Museum of Art. Lewes, UK, Cleveland, Ohio: GILES; Cleveland Museum of Art, 2023.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 80-83, no. 5b",
"url": ""
}
],
"catalogue_raisonne": "Rosenberg and Prat 393",
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/1973.36",
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"creditline": "Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund",
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{
"id": 1643,
"description": "Jacques-Louis David (French, 1748\u20131825)",
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"biography": "The founder and leading painter of the neoclassical movement in France, Jacques-Louis David was born in Paris to a prosperous family of artists and archi-tects. In 1766 he entered the Acad\u00e9mie Royale as the pupil of Joseph-Marie Vien (1716-1809). After several failed attempts, David won the Prix de Rome in 1774. The following year he left for Italy, where he studied antique art and envisioned replacing the frivolity of the rococo with an art of grandeur, simplicity, and moral virtue. After returning to Paris in 1780, he established his reputa-tion with three spectacular successes at the Salon: The Oath of the Horatii (1785, Mus\u00e9e du Louvre, Paris), The Death of Socrates (1787, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), and The Lictors Bring-ing Brutus the Bodies of His Sons (1789, Mus\u00e9e du Louvre, Paris). Widely interpreted as moral parables for contemporary political events, these archetypes of neoclassical aesthetics set the standard for academic painting of the next century. In the 1790s David joined the radical Jacobin Club and played an active role in the French Revolution. He allied himself with Robespierre, served a short term as president of the Convention, and voted for the execution of Louis XVI. He also placed his artistic talents at the service of the Revolution by creating paintings that glorified its martyrs and by organizing public festivals that celebrated the new political order. As the most prominent artist in the revolutionary ranks, he led the attack against the Acad\u00e9mie Royale that culminated in its abolish-ment in 1793. When the excesses of the Reign of Terror precipitated the fall of Robespierre in 1794, David was imprison-ed but spared execution. Authorities released him the following year due to ill health. Around 1798 David developed a new alliance with the brilliant young general of the Directory, Napol\u00e9on Bonaparte. David's painting The Intervention of the Sabine Women (1799, Mus\u00e9e du Louvre, Paris) coalesced perfectly with Napoleonic propaganda urging national reconciliation. After the coup d'\u00e9tat of 1799, Napol\u00e9on was named first consul and began supplying David with important commissions. Upon Napol\u00e9on's coronation in 1804, David was appointed first painter to the emperor. David's monumental painting The Coronation of Napol\u00e9on, or Le Sacre (1805-7, Mus\u00e9e du Louvre, Paris), introduced a less spartan, more colorful and emotive style. However, as seen in his life-size portrait Napol\u00e9on in His Study (1812, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.), David increasingly searched to balance this new heroic-romanticism with an exacting realism. In 1816, following Napol\u00e9on's defeat at Waterloo and the restoration of the monarchy, David went into exile in Belgium. He spent the last nine years of his life in Brussels, painting mostly mythological subjects and portraits. David died of a stroke in 1825 and was denied burial in France.",
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1748",
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"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "1973-05-07T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1816,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "c. 1816\u201322",
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"updated_at": "2026-06-19 11:13:35.544000"
}
}