Lot Essay
Paul Delaroche began his career by studying landscape painting under the guidance of Watelet. In 1817, Delaroche moved to the atelier of Gros, an established history painter. It was this genre of painting that led to Delaroche's great popular success, most notably with the 1831 Salon entry Les enfants d'Edouard, now in the Louvre. His prodigious output comprised not only well-loved historical tales painted with great attention to detail, but a multitude of portraits and religious subjects.
The pathos of Christ in the Garden of Olives appealed to the romantic sensibility of the first half of the 19th century. Delacroix painted the subject for the Church of St. Paul-St. Louis, commissioned by the State in 1824, as did Chassériau who executed a painting of the same theme also for the ministry of the interior for the Church of St. Jean d'Angely. Delaroche narrates with economy and simplicity of execution. In the present painting of 1845, using a composition already established bythe Renaissance, Delaroche places Christ on a rocky eminence with the three disciples (Peter with his grey hair and beard, James with dark hair and beard and John, the youngest, with his long hair) asleep below. He has also added the menacing outline of a serpent about to strike - symbol of the temptation and a reminder of the Garden of Eden.
As pointed out by Jocelyne Reboul, this early symbolic composition foreshadows Delaroche's late major work of 1855, Une Martyre au temps de Diocletien now in the Louvre.
An engraving of Christ in the Garden of Olives has been executed by Jules François (Expositions de Paul Delaroche - Explications de tableaux, dessins, aquarelles et gravures, op. cit., p. 38).
The pathos of Christ in the Garden of Olives appealed to the romantic sensibility of the first half of the 19th century. Delacroix painted the subject for the Church of St. Paul-St. Louis, commissioned by the State in 1824, as did Chassériau who executed a painting of the same theme also for the ministry of the interior for the Church of St. Jean d'Angely. Delaroche narrates with economy and simplicity of execution. In the present painting of 1845, using a composition already established bythe Renaissance, Delaroche places Christ on a rocky eminence with the three disciples (Peter with his grey hair and beard, James with dark hair and beard and John, the youngest, with his long hair) asleep below. He has also added the menacing outline of a serpent about to strike - symbol of the temptation and a reminder of the Garden of Eden.
As pointed out by Jocelyne Reboul, this early symbolic composition foreshadows Delaroche's late major work of 1855, Une Martyre au temps de Diocletien now in the Louvre.
An engraving of Christ in the Garden of Olives has been executed by Jules François (Expositions de Paul Delaroche - Explications de tableaux, dessins, aquarelles et gravures, op. cit., p. 38).