671. Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780-1867),

French, Louis- François Bertin (1766-1841), 1832.

Oil on canvas, 116 x 95 cm.

Musée du Louvre, Paris. Neoclassicism.

 

 

One of Ingres’ most outstanding portrait work is the portrait of Louis-François Bertin from 1832. Ingres succeeded in painting the former director of the Journal des débats in Paris and proponent of the new monarchy as a typical representative of the triumphant bourgeoisie under Louis-Philippe I. The sixty-six year old Bertin sits with an elegant dress in a round back rest chair and look deeply into the eyes of the contemplator. Head and hands of the publisher form a colour contrast to the dark dress and refer symbolically to the reasoned actions of the portrayed man. Supporting himself with his wrinkled and slightly oversized hands on his knees, the man looks like he would like to go back to work as soon as possible. The outline and the form are in this neoclassical oil painting as against to the colour characteristically emphasized. Ingres plays with the distortion of the perspective in the image space and deviate from the academic painting to a more modern style. Details like the glasses in his right trouser pocket or the reflection of the light from the window on the chair refer nevertheless to a realistic illustration of the model.

When in 1833 the portrait was exhibited at the Salon in Paris, the visitors were on the one hand fascinated by the clear and realistic execution and on the other hand they reacted indignantly to the vulgar preciseness of Ingres pictorial imagination, because he dared to picture the respectable business man with tousled hair and stout figure. Later his daughter even wrote her father looked like a lordly gentleman, but Ingres transformed him in a plump peasant.

Today the famous portrait of Louis-François Bertin hangs in the Musée du Louvre and is still seen in its historical context as the embodiment of a whole social stratum. Édouard Manet described Bertin as “the Buddha of the self-satisfied, well-to-do, triumphant bourgeoisie.” Ingres succeeded finally with this portrait by throwing a new light on the Academic art in anticipation of the modern period.