id: 162396 accession number: 2002.91 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/2002.91 updated: 2023-12-08 10:05:54.178000 Cupid and Psyche, 1813. Jacques-Louis David (French, 1748–1825). Gray wash and pen and black ink with white paint and traces of black chalk ; sheet: 16.7 x 22.4 cm (6 9/16 x 8 13/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund 2002.91 title: Cupid and Psyche title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: 1813 creation date earliest: 1813 creation date latest: 1813 current location: creditline: Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund copyright: --- culture: France, 19th century technique: gray wash and pen and black ink with white paint and traces of black chalk department: Drawings collection: DR - French type: Drawing find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS * Jacques-Louis David (French, 1748–1825) - artist 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 Académie 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, Musée 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, Musée 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 Académie 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, Napoléon Bonaparte. David's painting The Intervention of the Sabine Women (1799, Musée du Louvre, Paris) coalesced perfectly with Napoleonic propaganda urging national reconciliation. After the coup d'état of 1799, Napoléon was named first consul and began supplying David with important commissions. Upon Napoléon's coronation in 1804, David was appointed first painter to the emperor. David's monumental painting The Coronation of Napoléon, or Le Sacre (1805-7, Musée du Louvre, Paris), introduced a less spartan, more colorful and emotive style. However, as seen in his life-size portrait Napoléon 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 Napoléon'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. --- measurements: Sheet: 16.7 x 22.4 cm (6 9/16 x 8 13/16 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: description: laid paper watermarks: inscriptions: inscription: signed and dated, lower right: L. David 1813. translation: remark: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Jacques-Louis David: Empire to Exile opening date: 2005-02-01T00:00:00 Jacques-Louis David: Empire to Exile. J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA (February 1-April 24, 2005). title: Jacques Louis David: Radical Draftsman opening date: 2022-02-17T05:00:00 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. --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS * Neo-Classicism and Romanticism in French Painting, 1774-1826). Richard L. Feigen & Co., New York (1994). * Ein Blick auf Amor und Psyche um 1800. Musée de Carouge (March 17 - May 1, 1994); Kunsthaus Zürich (May 20 - July 17, 1994). * The Classical Ideal: Athens to Picasso. David Carritt Limited, London (November 15 - December 14, 1979). * Exhibition of French Drawings: Neo-Classicism. Heim Gallery, London (February 20 - March 27, 1975). --- PROVENANCE Given by the artist to Nicholas Phillippe Auguste, Compte de Forbin [1777-1841], Paris date: after 1813-after 1841 footnotes: citations: Private collection, Paris date: ?-? footnotes: citations: (sale, Hotel Drouot, November 7, 1973, no. 107) date: 1973 footnotes: *
Artist and date misidentified in this sale.
citations: (Galerie Arnoldi-Livie, Munich) date: 1975-? footnotes: citations: (Heim Gallery, London) date: by 1975 footnotes: citations: (Artemis Group (David Carritt), London) date: by 1979-? footnotes: citations: (Eugene V. Thaw, New York) date: after 1979-? footnotes: citations: Ed Hill, El Paso, Texas date: ?-? footnotes: citations: Elizabeth Eddy, Ohio date: ?-? footnotes: citations: (Richard L. Feigen & Co., New York) date: around 1980-? footnotes: citations: Paul Weiss, New York date: ?-? footnotes: citations: (Richard L. Feigen & Co., New York, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH) date: by 1994-2003 footnotes: citations: Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 2002- footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: --- RELATED WORKS id: 138464 Cupid and Psyche, 1817. Jacques-Louis David (French, 1748-1825). Oil on canvas; framed: 221 x 282 x 10 cm (87 x 111 x 3 15/16 in.); unframed: 184.2 x 241.6 cm (72 1/2 x 95 1/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund 1962.37 relationship: preparatory for --- CITATIONS David, Jacques Louis Jules. Le peintre Louis David, 1748-1825: souvenirs & documents inédits. Paris: Victor Havard, 1880 page number: Mentioned: p. 663 url: Hautecoeur, Louis. Louis David. Paris: Table Ronde, 1954. page number: Mentioned: p. 268 url: The Age of Neo-Classicism. Exh. Cat. London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1972. page number: Mentioned: p. 48 url: Estampes anciennes, beaux livres illustres, dessins anciens. Paris: Hotel Drouot, 1973. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: no. 107 url: Exhibition of French Drawings: Neo-Classicism. Exh. Cat. London: Heim Gallery, 1975. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: no. 26 url: The Classical Ideal: Athens to Picasso. Exh. Cat. London: David Carritt Limited, 1979. page number: Mentioned: p. 35, no. 25; Reproduced: p. 34 url: Schnapper, Antoine. David, témoin de son temps. Fribourg, Office du livre, 1980. page number: Mentioned: p. 297 url: Coekelberghs, Denis and Pierre Loze. Autour du neo-classicisme en belgique, 1770-1830. Exh. Cat. Brussels: Musée communal des Beaux-Arts, 1985. page number: Mentioned: p. 182 url: Johnson, Dorothy. "Desire Demythologized: David's L'Amour Quittant Psyché." Art History 9, no. 4 (December 1986): 450-70. page number: Mentioned: p. 467, n. 32 url: Jacques-Louis David, 1748-1825. Exh. Cat. Paris: Musée du Louvre, 1989. page number: Mentioned: pp. 506, 518 url: Sérullaz, Arlette. Inventaire général des dessins, école française, dessins de Jacques-Louis David. Paris: Éditions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, 1991. page number: Mentioned: p. 311 url: Neo-Classicism and Romanticism in French Painting, 1774-1826. Exh. Cat. New York: Richard L. Feigen & Co., 1994. page number: Mentioned: pp. 26-28, no. 8; Reproduced: p. 27 url: Lang, Paul. Ein Blick auf Amor und Psyche um 1800. Exh. Cat. Zürich: Kunsthaus Zürich, 1994. page number: Mentioned: pp. 125-31, no. 28; Reproduced: p. 127 url: Vidal, Mary. "'With a Pretty Whisper': Deception and Transformation in David's Cupid and Psyche and Apuleius's Metamorphoses." Art History 22, no. 2 (June 1999): 214-43. page number: Mentioned: p. 221; Reproduced: p. 223, fig. 33 url: d'Argencourt, Louise. European Paintings of the 19th-Century. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1999. page number: Mentioned: vol. 1, p. 201, n. 3 url: Bordes, Philippe. Jacques-Louis David: Empire to Exile. Exh. Cat. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 2005. page number: Mentioned: pp. 220-24, no. 30; Reproduced: p. 221 url: Lampe, Issa. "Painting History Ex Patria: Empire, Exile, and Memory in the Late Narrative Paintings of Jacques-Louis David (1817-1824)." Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 2006. page number: Mentioned: p. vii; Reproduced: p. 266, fig. 5 url: Allard, Sébastian and Marie-Claude Chaudonneret. Le suicide de Gros: les peintres de l'empire et la génération romantique. Paris: Gourcuff Gradenigo, 2010. page number: Mentioned: p. 27; Reproduced: p. 64 url: Johnson, Dorothy. David to Delacroix: The Rise of Romantic Mythology. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2011. page number: Mentioned: p. 89; Reproduced: p. 90 url: Prat, Louis-Antoine. Le dessin français au XIXe siècle. Paris: Louvre Editions, 2012. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: p. 63, fig. 118 url: David, Jacques Louis, and Perrin Stein. Jacques Louis David: Radical Draftsman. 2022, 244. page number: Mentioned and reproduced, pp. 244-245, no. 77. url: --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/2002.91/2002.91_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/2002.91/2002.91_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/2002.91/2002.91_full.tif