Ingres

This new monograph explores the career of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780-1867), one of the most important artists of the nineteenth-century Neoclassical period. Ingres' life spans one of the most tumultuous periods in French history: born less than nine years before the storming of the Bastille, the painter would eventually bear witness to three revolutions and the rise and fall (and eventual resurrection) of a rapid succession of monarchical, republican, and imperial regimes. Like many of his contemporaries, Ingres considered history paintings to be the most exalted form of art, with portraiture a lesser genre. Even during his lifetime, however, tastes were changing, and while icons like his Turkish Bath and his Grande Odalisque are still highly regarded, Ingres is most admired today for his innovative portraits, which transcend time in their physical and psychological beauty.

In this insightful and unbiased survey, Andrew Shelton discusses all of Ingres' key paintings and drawings, thereby providing the reader with a comprehensive portrait of the seventy-year career of this celebrated artist.

Nancy J. Mactague - Library Journal

A conservative classicist working at the advent of industrialization, consumerism, and photography, Ingres felt himself to be out of step with his times. Shelton (art history, Ohio State Univ.; Ingres and His Critics) writes that the art historian's job is not to determine whether Ingres was "a classicist, a realist, or a modernist," but to help us understand Ingres as a product of the "social, political and cultural schizophrenia of the age in which he lived." Shelton traces Ingres's career chronologically, finishing with Ingres's influence on subsequent artists including unlikely candidates such as Man Ray and Cindy Sherman. With 160 color and 20 black-and-white illustrations of both drawings and paintings, this book offers an introduction to Ingres's art in an easy-to-read style. Including a time line, brief biographies of Ingres's contemporaries, and a glossary, this is a good value for public, academic, and specialized libraries.

Andrew Shelton is Associate Professor in the History of Art Department at the Ohio State University. He is an authority on Ingres and has lectured widely on the artist in both the United States and Europe. He recently served as co-author of the exhibition catalogue Portraits by Ingres: Images of an Epoch. Dr. Shelton is currently working on a book devoted to Ingres and the conventions of nineteenth-century French art criticism.