Liberty Leading the People

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Liberty Leading the People: Eugene Delacroix

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Eugene Delacroix Oil Painting - Liberty Leading the People

Keywords: Liberty, Leading, People

Work Overview: Liberty Leading the People
French: La Liberté guidant le peuple
Artist Eugène Delacroix
Year 1830
Medium Oil on canvas
Dimensions 260 cm × 325 cm (102.4 in × 128.0 in)
Location Louvre, Paris

Liberty Leading the People (French: La Liberté guidant le peuple [la libɛʁte ɡidɑ̃ lə pœpl]) is a painting by Eugène Delacroix commemorating the July Revolution of 1830, which toppled King Charles X of France. A woman personifying the concept and the Goddess of Liberty leads the people forward over a barricade and the bodies of the fallen, holding the flag of the French Revolution – the tricolour flag, which remains France's national flag – in one hand and brandishing a bayonetted musket with the other. The figure of Liberty is also viewed as a symbol of France and the French Republic known as Marianne.

By the time Delacroix painted Liberty Leading the People, he was already the acknowledged leader of the Romantic school in French painting.[2] Delacroix, who was born as the Age of Enlightenment was giving way to the ideas and style of romanticism, rejected the emphasis on precise drawing that characterised the academic art of his time, and instead gave a new prominence to freely brushed colour.

Delacroix painted his work in the autumn of 1830. In a letter to his brother dated 21 October, he wrote: "My bad mood is vanishing thanks to hard work. I’ve embarked on a modern subject—a barricade. And if I haven’t fought for my country at least I’ll paint for her." The painting was first exhibited at the official Salon of 1831.

Delacroix depicted Liberty as both an allegorical goddess-figure and a robust woman of the people. The mound of corpses acts as a kind of pedestal from which Liberty strides, barefoot and bare-breasted, out of the canvas and into the space of the viewer. The Phrygian cap she wears had come to symbolize liberty during the first French Revolution, of 1789–94. The painting has been seen as a marker to the end of the Age of Enlightenment, as many scholars see the end of the French Revolution as the start of the romantic era.[3]

The fighters are from a mixture of social classes, ranging from the bourgeoisie represented by the young man in a top hat, a student from the prestigious École Polytechnique wearing the traditional bicorne, to the revolutionary urban worker, as exemplified by the boy holding pistols. What they have in common is the fierceness and determination in their eyes. Aside from the flag held by Liberty, a second, minute tricolore can be discerned in the distance flying from the towers of Notre Dame.[4]

The identity of the man in the top hat has been widely debated. The suggestion that it was a self-portrait by Delacroix has been discounted by modern art historians.[5] In the late 19th century, it was suggested the model was the theatre director Étienne Arago; others have suggested the future curator of the Louvre, Frédéric Villot;[6] but there is no firm consensus on this point.

Several of the figures are probably borrowed from a print by popular artist Nicolas Charlet, a prolific illustrator who Delacroix believed captured, more than anyone else, the peculiar energy of the Parisians.

The French government bought the painting in 1831 for 3,000 francs with the intention of displaying it in the throne room of the Palais du Luxembourg as a reminder to the "citizen-king" Louis-Philippe of the July Revolution, through which he had come to power. This plan did not come to fruition and the canvas hung in the palace's museum gallery for a few months, before being removed due to its inflammatory political message. After the June Rebellion of 1832, it was returned to the artist. According to Albert Boime,

Champfleury wrote in August 1848 that it had been “hidden in an attic for being too revolutionary.” Although Louis-Philippe's Ministry of the Interior initially acquired it as a gesture to the Left, after the uprising at the funeral of Lamarque in June 1832 it was never again openly displayed for fear of setting a bad example.[8]

Delacroix was permitted to send the painting to his aunt Félicité for safekeeping. It was exhibited briefly in 1848, after the Republic was restored in the revolution of that year, and then in the Salon of 1855. In 1874, the painting entered the collection of Palais du Louvre in Paris.

In 1974–75, the work was the featured work in an exhibit organized by the French government, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Detroit Institute of Arts as a Bicentennial gift to the people of the United States. The exhibit, entitled French Painting 1774–1830: The Age of Revolution, marked a rare display of the Delacroix painting, and many of the other 148 works, outside France.[9] The exhibit was first shown at the Grand Palais from 16 November 1974 to 3 February 1975. It moved to Detroit from 5 March to 4 May 1975, then New York from 12 June to 7 September 1975.[10]

In 1999, it was flown on board an Airbus Beluga from Paris to Tokyo via Bahrain and Calcutta in about 20 hours. The large canvas, measuring 2.99 metres (9.8 feet) high by 3.62 metres (11.9 feet) long, was too large to fit into a Boeing 747. It was transported in the vertical position inside a special pressurised container provided with isothermal protection and an anti-vibration device.[11]

In 2012, it was moved to the new Louvre-Lens museum in Lens, Pas-de-Calais, as the starring work in the first tranche of paintings from the Louvre's collection to be installed.[12] On 7 February 2013, the painting was vandalized by a visitor in Lens. An unidentified 28-year-old woman allegedly wrote an inscription ("AE911") on the painting.[13][14] The woman was immediately arrested by a security guard and a visitor. A short time after the incident, the management of the Louvre and its Pas-de-Calais branch published a press release indicating that "at first glance, the inscription is superficial and should be easily removed".[15][16] Louvre officials announced the next day that the writing had been removed in less than two hours by a restorer without damaging the original paint, and the piece returned to display that morning.

Although Delacroix was not the first artist to depict Liberty in Phrygian cap, his painting may be the best known early version of the figure commonly known as Marianne, a symbol of the French Republic and of France in general.[17]

The painting may have influenced Victor Hugo's novel Les Misérables. In particular, the character of Gavroche is widely believed to have been inspired by the figure of the pistol-wielding boy running over the barricade.[18][19] The novel describes the events of the June Rebellion two years after the revolution celebrated in the painting, the same rebellion that led to its being removed from public view.

The painting inspired Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi's Liberty Enlightening the World, formally known as the Statue of Liberty in New York City,[20] which was given to the United States as a gift from the French a half-century after Liberty Leading the People was painted. The statue, which holds a torch in its hand, takes a more stable, immovable stance than that of the woman in the painting. An engraved version of part of the painting, along with a depiction of Delacroix, was featured on the 100 franc note from 1978 to 1995.

The painting has had an influence on classical music. George Antheil titled his Symphony No. 6 After Delacroix, and stated that the work was inspired by Liberty Leading the People.[21] The imagery was adapted by Robert Ballagh to commemorate Ireland's independence struggle on an Irish postage stamp in 1979, the centenary of the birth of Pádraig Pearse,[22] and the painting was used for the band Coldplay's album cover Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends, with the words Viva La Vida written in white.[23] The cover of the book Enough is Enough: How to Build a New Republic by Fintan O'Toole references the painting, but with Kathleen Ni Houlihan holding the Irish tricolour in Dublin while the leaders of the three main political parties at the time (Brian Cowen, Enda Kenny and Eamon Gilmore) lie on the ground.[24]

A BBC podcast discussion about the picture was broadcast in 2011.

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The Paris uprising of July 27, 28, and 29, 1830, known as the Trois Glorieuses ("Three Glorious Days"), was initiated by the liberal republicans for violation of the Constitution by the Second Restoration government. Charles X, the last Bourbon king of France, was overthrown and replaced by Louis Philippe, Duke of Orléans. Delacroix, who witnessed the uprising, perceived it as a modern subject for a painting; the resulting work reflects the same romantic fervor he had applied to Massacre at Chios, a painting inspired by the Greek war of independence.
A patriotic act
Delacroix's imagination was fired by all manner of things—the natural world, a Gothic ribbed vault, a feline, a journey, a human passion... or an event that changed the course of history and reversed artistic trends. He translated his deeply felt emotions into painting, constantly renewing his style. His emotional temperament largely explains the force of his portrayal of the recent explosion of rage on the streets of Paris.
No doubt he felt a personal involvement too, through his friendship with protagonists of the conflict such as Adolphe Thiers, who wavered between maintenance of the constitutional Monarchy and restoration of the Republic. Delacroix depended on commissions from institutions and members of the royal family, and his personal ambiguity probably confined him to the role of simple bystander (noted by Alexandre Dumas), but as a citizen-artist he helped protect the Louvre's collections from the rioters and, nostalgic for the Napoleonic Empire, was moved to see the tricolor hoisted to the top of Notre-Dame by the insurgents.
The time had come to fulfill his own patriotic duty. He wrote to his nephew Charles Verninac: "Three days amid gunfire and bullets, as there was fighting all around. A simple stroller like myself ran the same risk of stopping a bullet as the impromptu heroes who advanced on the enemy with pieces of iron fixed to broom handles."
Delacroix began his allegorical interpretation of the Parisian epic in September 1830. His painting was completed between October and December, and exhibited at the Salon in May 1831.
As was his habit, he developed his plan for the painting using preliminary sketches for every element and at every stage. He also drew from the repertory of motifs that he had compiled on a daily basis from the beginning of his career. He thus completed the work in three months, focusing on the dramatic and visual impact of the scene: the crowd breaking through the barricades to make its final assault on the enemy camp.
The peak of fervor occasioned by victory is represented in a pyramidal composition; the base, strewn with corpses, resembles a pedestal supporting the image of the victors. Delacroix had used a similarly rigorous composition for his painting entitled Greece on the Ruins of Missolonghi, and a comparable structure is apparent in Géricault's Raft of the Medusa. Here, it serves to contain and balance the painter's vigorous brushwork, and the impetuous rhythm of the scene.
A Parisian revolution
The allegory of Liberty is personified by a young woman of the people wearing the Phrygian cap, her curls escaping onto her neck. Vibrant, fiery, rebellious, and victorious, she evokes the Revolution of 1789, the sans-culotte, and popular sovereignty. In her raised right hand is the red, white, and blue flag, a symbol of struggle that unfurls toward the light like a flame.
Liberty wears a yellow dress reminiscent of classical drapery, held in at the waist by a belt whose ends float at her side. It has slipped below her breasts, revealing the underarm hair considered vulgar by classical artists who decreed that a goddess's skin should be smooth. The erotic realism of her nudity recalls the ancient winged victories. Her Greek profile, straight nose, generous mouth, delicate chin, and smoldering gaze are reminiscent of the woman who posed for the Women of Algiers in their Apartment. She stands noble and resolute, her body illuminated on the right, cutting a distinct figure among the men as she turns her head to spur them on to final victory. Her dark left side stands out against a plume of smoke. Her weight is on her bare left foot, visible below her dress. She may be an allegory, but this is a real battle, and she is caught up in the heat of the moment. The infantry gun with bayonet (1816 model) in her left hand gives her a contemporary look and a certain credibility.
Two Parisian urchins have spontaneously joined the fight: the one on the left clings to the cobblestones, wide-eyed under his light infantry cap; the more famous figure to the right of Liberty is Gavroche, a symbol of youthful revolt against injustice and sacrifice for a noble cause. He sports the black velvet beret (or faluche) worn by students, as a symbol of rebellion, and carries an overlarge cartridge pouch slung across his shoulder. He advances right foot forward, brandishing cavalry pistols with one arm raised, a war cry on his lips as he exhorts the insurgents to fight.
The fighter whose beret bears a white royalist cockade and red liberal ribbon and who carries an infantry saber (1816 model) or briquet, is recognizably a factory worker with his apron and sailor trousers. The scarf holding his pistol in place on his belly evokes the Cholet handkerchief—a rallying sign for Royalist leader Charette and the Vendeans.
The kneeling figure with the top hat of a bourgeois or fashionable urbanite may be Delacroix himself, or one of his friends. He wears loose-fitting trousers and an artisan's red flannel belt, and carries a double-barreled hunting gun. The wounded man raising himself up at the sight of Liberty wears a knotted yellowish scarf, echoing the color of the heroine's dress; his peasant's smock and red flannel belt suggest the temporary workers of Paris. The blue jacket, red belt, and white shirt echo the colors of the flag.
A modern subject
"I have undertaken a modern subject, a barricade, and although I may not have fought for my country, at least I shall have painted for her. It has restored my good spirits" (letter of October 28 to his brother). The soldiers lying on the ground take up the foreground at the base of the pyramidal structure. In addition to the figure of Liberty, the corpse without trousers on the left, with arms outstretched and tunic turned up, is another mythical reference, derived from a classical nude model known as Hector—a personification of the Homeric hero. The Swiss guard lying on his back, to the right of the scene, has contemporary campaign uniform: a gray-blue greatcoat with a red decoration on the collar, white gaiters, low shoes, and a shako. A cuirassier with a white epaulette, lying face down next to him, is visible down to the waist.
To the left at the back of the triangle are students (including a student of the Ecole Polytechnique with his Bonapartist cocked hat) and a detachment of grenadiers in gray greatcoats and campaign uniform.
Although the right background of the painting contains elements of an urban landscape, it seems empty and distant in comparison with the pitched battle that fills the left side of the scene. The towers of Notre Dame represent liberty and Romanticism—as they did for Victor Hugo—and situate the action in Paris. Their position on the left bank of the Seine is inexact, and the houses between the Cathedral and the river are pure products of the painter's imagination. A sunset glow, mingled with the canon smoke, illuminates the baroque postures of the bodies and shines bright in the right background, creating an aura around Liberty, the young boy, and the tricolor flag.
As we have already seen, the composition is given unity by the painter's particularly skilful use of color; the blue, white, and red elements have counterpoints; the white of the parallel straps across the fighters’ shoulders echoes that of the gaiters and of the shirt on the corpse to the left, while the gray tonality enhances the red of the flag.
Delacroix was admired by Charles X, who purchased The Massacre at Chios and the Death of Charles the Bold. The artist's friends included the Duchesse de Berry and the Orléans family. He liked to attract attention in the circles of power and make his mark on public opinion, but was considered at that time as leader of the Romantic movement and was impassioned by liberty. His emotion during the Three Glorious Days was sincere, and was expressed to the glory of the "noble, beautiful, and great" citizens of his country.
Delacroix's historical and political painting—a blend of document and symbol, actuality and fiction, reality and allegory—bears witness to the death throes of the Ancien Régime.
This realistic and innovative work, a symbol of Liberty and the pictorial revolution, was rejected by the critics, who were used to more classical representations of reality. Having hailed the accession of Louis-Philippe, the work was hidden from public view during the king's reign, and only entered the Musée du Luxembourg in 1863 and the Louvre in 1874. It is now perceived as a universal work—a representation of romantic and revolutionary fervor, heir to the historical painting of the 18th century and forerunner of Picasso's Guernica in the 20th.

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Through July 28: Liberty Leading the People, Delacroix tells the story of Trois Glorieuses - Three Glorious Days - the Parisian uprising on July 27, 28, and 29 of 1830.

The liberal republicans were outraged by the violation of the Constitution, and overthrew Charles X, who was to be the last Bourbon king of France. His predecessor was Louis Philippe, the Duke of Orleans.

In this artwork Liberty is personified in the form of a vibrant, rebellious, bare breasted woman who leads the people to victory. She carries the flag proudly. Thrilled to have a modern subject to paint, Delacroix took to the canvas with great pride and patriotism. Though he had not taken an active part in the fighting of the revolution he had done his share for his country.

Instead of guns and cannons he used an easel and a paintbrush - he felt it was his duty as a painter to record this event as the revolutionists felt it was their duty to fight.

The artist was touched by the three days of revolt by the upper-class, the middle-class, and the lower-class in France all fighting to overthrow Charles X to show their outrage of the violation of the constitution and thus he paid honor to this event by providing a historical recount of French history.

July 28: Liberty Leading the People is one of his most remembered and favored works today.

Delacroix wanted to paint July 28: Liberty Leading the People to take his own special action in the revolution and his color technique combined his intense brushstrokes to create an unforgettable canvas.

Composition:
Delacroix main compositional device is the pyramid shape; the figure of Liberty is the peak and the dead fighters below her form the base. This pyramid technique balances out the hectic and crowded canvas.

Color palette:
Delacroix's use of color is never surface level. He repeats the color of the French flag to emphasize the power of France and the power of her people.

To connect the heroine Liberty with the fighting people, Delacroix uses the same color of her dress on the neck tie of a revolutionist and his colors are repeated used throughout the canvas to create unity, representing that of the revolutionists.

Use of light:
Delacroix uses light to illuminate Liberty and to highlight a dead fighter beneath her.

Tone elicited:
This piece conjures up feelings of power, of freedom and of victory while paying tribute to those who died fighting for their cause and country.

Brushstroke:
The emotional rhythm of Delacroix's brushstroke seemed to be a vital part of his originality. In its diversity one can see long and large, continuous strokes as well as small, divided, independent ones.

This painting celebrated the day, during the 1830 Revolution, that the people rose and fought for their liberty. Delacroix used the painting as a political poster for the revolution. Delacroix was a member of the National Gaurd, and he placed himself into the picture as the man on the left wearing a top-hat (close-up shown below).

Argan defined this canvas as the first political work of modern painting. There is a sense of full participation from the artist. With the outstretched figure of liberty, the vibrant, bold fighters contrasting to the lifeless dead casualties in the foreground, the heroic poses of the people fighting for liberty, the painting illustrates the struggle of the people for their liberty, and allows the viewer to empathize with that struggle.

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