id: 154305 accession number: 1989.101 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1989.101 updated: 2023-01-27 17:32:19.535000 The Meeting of Orestes and Hermione, c. 1800. Anne-Louis Girodet de Roucy-Trioson (French, 1767–1824). Pen and brown and black ink, point of brush and brown and gray wash, with black chalk and graphite, heightened with white gouache, on cream wove paper; sheet: 28.5 x 21.8 cm (11 1/4 x 8 9/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund 1989.101 title: The Meeting of Orestes and Hermione title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: c. 1800 creation date earliest: 1795 creation date latest: 1805 current location: 101B Prints & Drawings creditline: Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund copyright: --- culture: France, early 19th Century technique: pen and brown and black ink, point of brush and brown and gray wash, with black chalk and graphite, heightened with white gouache, on cream wove paper department: Drawings collection: DR - French type: Drawing find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS * Anne-Louis Girodet de Roucy-Trioson (French, 1767–1824) - artist On the advice of his architecture instructor Étienne-Louis Boullée (1728-1799), Girodet enrolled in the atelier of David (q.v.) in 1783 to study painting, working alongside other young artists like Gros (q.v.) and Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Wicar (1762-1834) who were also taught in David's neoclassical style. Girodet's early works display the influence of David in the linear and sculptural quality of his figures. After three consecutive years of competing for the Prix de Rome, he finally won at his fourth effort in 1789. Later that year the Revolution broke out in France and Girodet made numerous drawings of the fall of the Bastille. In 1790 he left for Italy where he stayed for five years. During that time his style changed and softened under the influence of the works of Leonardo (1452-1519) and Correggio (1489/94-1534). Girodet strove to be unique and original in his depictions and even went to great lengths to oppose David's neoclassicism. His new interest in atmospheric and light effects differed from that of his teacher. He made a name for himself at the Salon of 1793, with his submission of Sleep of Endymion (Musée du Louvre, Paris). After his return to Paris from Italy, Girodet became known as a portrait painter and accepted numerous commissions, but many of them were either late in delivery or never completed. Girodet's tendency to interpret commissions to prove his own originality often offended and alienated his patrons. He did not find official success at the Salon again until 1808 and produced little after 1815. --- measurements: Sheet: 28.5 x 21.8 cm (11 1/4 x 8 9/16 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: description: cream(1) wove paper watermarks: inscriptions: inscription: signed, lower left, in brown ink: ALG [artist’s monogram] / INV.; lower left, in black chalk: A L GIRODET INV. translation: remark: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: The Year in Review for 1989 opening date: 1990-02-06T05:00:00 The Year in Review for 1989. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 6-April 15, 1990). title: Directions in Drawing: 1750-1988 opening date: 1991-04-02T04:00:00 Directions in Drawing: 1750-1988. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (April 2-August 4, 1991). title: Visions of Antiquity: Neoclassical Figure Drawing opening date: 1993-07-22T04:00:00 Visions of Antiquity: Neoclassical Figure Drawing. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA (organizer) (July 22-September 19, 1993); Philadelphia Museum of Art (October 30, 1993-January 2, 1994); Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis, MN (February 6-April 3, 1994). title: French Drawings from the Collection opening date: 1994-12-13T05:00:00 French Drawings from the Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 13, 1994-March 12, 1995). title: Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art opening date: 2000-08-27T00:00:00 Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 27-October 17, 2000); The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NY (May 23-August 19, 2001); Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Houston, TX (October 14, 2001-January 6, 2002). title: Girodet: Romantic Rebel opening date: 2005-09-19T00:00:00 Girodet: Romantic Rebel. Musée du Louvre, Paris, France (September 19, 2005-January 2, 2006); The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY (May 22-August 27, 2006). title: Treasures on Paper from the Collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art opening date: 2014-03-09T00:00:00 Treasures on Paper from the Collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (March 9-June 8, 2014). title: Elegance and Intrigue: French Society in 18th-century Prints and Drawings opening date: 2016-07-16T04:00:00 Elegance and Intrigue: French Society in 18th-century Prints and Drawings. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 16-November 6, 2016). title: Nineteenth-Century French Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art opening date: 2023-01-20T05:00:00 Nineteenth-Century French Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 20-April 30, 2023). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS * Salon de 1800. Musée du Louvre, Paris (1800).

Master Drawings, 1760–1880. W. M. Brady & Co., New York (May 2–22, 1990). --- PROVENANCE Pierre Didot l’Ainé [1760–1853], Paris, given with other drawings in vellum edition to his brother, Firmin Didot date: ?-? footnotes: citations: Firmin Didot [1764–1836], Paris date: ?-1810 footnotes: *
A mention in the 1824 book catalogue by Van Praet suggests that the drawing was still in Firmin Didot's possession that year.
citations: (his sale, De Bure, Paris, 1810, no. 679 [withdrawn from sale]) date: 1810 footnotes: citations: Didot family collection, Paris date: 1810-by 1947 footnotes: citations: Frederick J. Cummings [1933–1990], New York date: ?-1989 footnotes: citations: (W. M. Brady & Co. Inc., New York, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art) date: 1989 footnotes: *
Master Drawings 1760-1880. New York: W. M. Brady & Co. Inc., 1990, no. 17 (repr.).
citations: Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1989- footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: The leg of the table behind Hermione has the form of a siren, a dangerous mythological creature that destroys anyone who hears its song. digital description: When the French painter Jacques-Louis David was approached to work on a new edition of Jean Racine’s plays, he passed the task to his pupil Girodet, who excelled at illustrating literature. This highly refined drawing depicts a scene from Racine’s Andromaque, a complicated story of unrequited love and political treachery. Cléone introduces the love-blind Orestes to Hermione, who exploits his affection to make him do her bidding. Girodet skillfully contrasts Orestes’s eagerness and Hermione’s calculating character. With folded arms, she turns away, as if a statue between the columns of a cool marble interior. Yet Hermione’s sly, backward glance alerts the viewer of her cunning manipulation, which eventually drives Orestes mad. wall description: This drawing belongs to a series illustrating Andromaque (1667), a tragic drama by French playwright Jean Racine centered on a love triangle. Anne-Louis Girodet de Roucy-Trioson focused on the play’s psychological tension rather than its violence, as the main characters, Orestes and Hermione, meet. He created both compositional sketches and nude studies of individual figures, later writing that the drawing “demand[ed] the same conception . . . as a painting.” The finished images were copied as engravings for publication. Cleveland’s drawing was bound in a luxury printed edition of Racine’s work and later sold by the publisher to recuperate the project’s high expenses. --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS Explication des ouvrages de peinture et dessins, sculpture, architecture et gravure, des artistes vivans [sic]. Paris: Imprimerie des sciences et arts, 1800. page number: Mentioned: p. 30, no. 170.2 url: Annales du musée et de l’école moderne des beaux-arts, première collection, tome complémentaire. Paris: C. P. Landon, 1809. page number: Mentioned: 71, 162; Reproduced: pl. 45 url: Catalogue des livres rares, précieux, et très-bien conditionnés, du cabinet de M. Firmin Didot. Paris: De Bure, 1810. page number: Mentioned: p. 96 url: Catalogue de livres imprimés sur vélin. Paris: De Bure, 1824. page number: Mentioned: vol. 2, p. 168 url: Coupin, P. A. Œuvres posthumes de Girodet-Trioson. Paris: Jules Renouard, 1829. page number: Mentioned: vol. 1: p. xxxix, lxxviij; vol. 2: p. 343 url: Collection des livrets des anciennes expositions depuis 1673 jusqu’en 1800: Exposition de 1800. Paris: Liepmannssohn, 1872. page number: Mentioned: p. 35, no. 170 url: L’Illustration en France et en Belgique de 1800 à 1914: Cent livres de la réserve précieuse du musée royal de Mariemont. Exh. cat. Mariemont: Musée royal de Mariemont, 1979. page number: Mentioned: p. 11 url: Osborne, Carol Margot. Pierre Didot the Elder and French Book Illustration, 1789–1822. New York: Garland, 1985. page number: Mentioned: pp. 37, 120-121, 226 url: Master Drawings, 1760–1880. Exh. cat. New York: W. M. Brady & Co., 1990. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: no. 17 url: Campbell, Richard J., and Victor Carlson. Visions of Antiquity: Neoclassical Figure Drawings. Exh. cat. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1993. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: pp. 37, 216-17, no. 55 url: DeGrazia, Diane and Carter E. Foster. Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Exh. cat. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2000. page number: Mentioned: pp. 9, 124, 290, no. 48; Reproduced: p. 125 url: Bellenger, Sylvain, Girodet 1767–1824. Exh. cat. Paris: Musée du Louvre, 2005. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: pp. 175n35, 440–41 (ill.), no. 110 url: Prat, Louis-Antoine. Le Dessin français au XIXe siècle. Paris: Louvre éditions, 2011. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: p. 77 url: --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1989.101/1989.101_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1989.101/1989.101_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1989.101/1989.101_full.tif