Nicolas Poussin

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Born: 1594

Died: 1695

Summary of Nicolas Poussin

Nicolas Poussin, a Frenchman who worked in Rome for almost all of his adult life, is credited with starting the French classical aesthetic style. His paintings are renowned for their narrative intensity and scientific and orderly approach to composition, and he specialised in biblical, ancient history, and mythology subjects on them. Poussin is revered for his mastery of colour and his preference for the intellectual above the emotive in his work. Through his layering of meaning, he made paintings of great dramatic depth and allegorical intricacy, demonstrating that art could be an intellectual endeavour. With time, Poussin’s work evolved as he painted landscapes and a series of pantheistic allegories that used nature’s harmonious forces to communicate their meaning. The Neoclassical Jacques-Louis David and his followers championed Poussin’s style above all other Classicists, despite his reputation being lowered throughout the first half of the 18th century. Since then, Poussin’s fame has only grown.

Poussin had shifted away from the expressive Mannerist style in the early 1630s and toward a more measured approach to composition. Classicism and Raphael gave Poussin his inspiration, while Venetian artist Titian showed his aim to utilise painting to transmit thoughts and ideals by fusing mythical and classical subjects. He aimed to arouse the viewer’s interest in his work by placing additional demands on their reflective abilities.

Poussin devised and perfected a remarkably symmetrical strategy that he put into effect. Stoic Hellenic philosophy influenced his mathematical structure and visual allegory. Poussein aimed to transmit principles about human existence and experience that were common to all human beings. As a result of his belief that we are all subject to circumstances beyond our control, he advocated rational reasoning and personal self-discipline as the sole means to a happy life.

Poussin used a darker palette and more free-form compositional forms in his later works to depict the interplay between the natural world and the human psyche. He used emotional landscape painting as a means of expressing human feelings that were either confused or uncontrolled. As a result, Poussin thought this would foster a deeper intellectual relationship between him and his audience members.

Biography of Nicolas Poussin

Childhood

He was born in 1594 in the village of Les Andelys, in Normandy, and was known as Nicolas Poussin when he was a child. An upper-class family had raised him, but things were tough for his parents and siblings. When it came to art, he was well-trained and had a solid foundation in several areas, including Latin and alphabet (he was apparently scolded by his teachers for doodling in his books). Quentin Varin, a French Baroque painter who was travelling through Poussin’s village, saw his work and urged him to pursue a career in painting. His parents, on the other hand, were adamantly opposed, leading the 18-year-old Poussin to flee to Paris in 1612.

When he first arrived in Paris, he studied a wide range of subjects, including anatomy and visual perspective, under the guidance of more experienced artists such as Georges Lalleman and Ferdinand Elle. People like Queen Marie de’ Medici of France donated numerous commissions to adorn her castle, while affluent landowners sought for unique religious works for their residences during a period when the art trade flourished. In any case, Poussin was still on the fringes and despised the studio system that required many people to work on the same piece. His creative future was sealed when he first saw Italian Renaissance art in Paris.

His professional life began to take off in the 1620s. His first commission came from the Jesuits in 1622, and the following year he was tasked with creating a picture for the cathedral in Paris. Poussin’s paintings for the Jesuits gained him some notoriety in the art world, and the court poet Giambattista Marino hired him to create a series of drawings for him as a result. As a result of this well-received commission, Marino invited the young painter to accompany him to Rome in 1623.

Early Life

Poussin came in Rome in 1624 and lived there until his death in 1665, with the exception of a brief sojourn in Paris. However, shortly after Poussin’s arrival, his patron and friend Marino passed away, leaving him in a precarious financial situation. On top of that, he had syphilis, and he would never get well. The early difficulties didn’t stop him from attending the Domenichino school in Italy, where he learned to paint naked women and visited churches and convents to study the work of the country’s greatest artists. Soon after, in 1627, he published his first novel, The Death of Germanicus. In addition, he painted The Martyrdom of St. Erasmus for the Vatican, which was his sole official commission. A good friend and patron of his was introduced to him at this time in Cassiano dal Pozzo. With the assistance of Dal Pozzo, Poussin was able to get other orders and solidify his status as a leading painter in Rome. Dal Pozzo taught literature, philosophy, and art history to Poussin as well as other subjects. His enthusiasm for learning and new concepts grew as his body of work became more sophisticated.

Poussin also met Claude Lorrain, a Frenchman of Italian descent (sometimes better known simply as Claude). Both individuals were close friends and even patronised by the neo-stoicist Cardinal Camillo Massimo, a fusion of Christianity and Classical Stoicism. Together with Claude, Poussin would go on sketching trips to the Campagna region to capture the majestic Roman scenery on paper (or canvas in Claude’s case). Poussin’s eyes were opened to the divine beauty of nature thanks to Claude, who painted with more spontaneity than his more intellectual countryman. Claude had already established himself as a master of landscape painting. Additionally, Poussin was good friends with the Baroque poet Giovanni Battista Marino, the printmaker and draughtsman Pietro Testa (with whom he shared an interest in ancient history), and the polymath Matteo Zaccolini, a specialist in perspective who also happened to be a writer, painter, mathematician, and Catholic priest.

Mid Life

Poussin tied the knot with Anne-Marie Dughet in 1630. He had saved up enough money by 1632 to buy them a tiny home on the Via Paolina. Despite the fact that he had always painted alone and had never created his own studio, the painter enjoyed a prolific phase during this time. The same time, he began painting landscapes, a genre that lacked the same historical significance as his Biblical and mythical storylines. As it turned out, Poussin’s foray into landscapes was critical to the growth of the genre…. Trips to the Roman countryside served as a source of inspiration for him, but he used them just as a setting for novels that he had already written. These years saw him create several of his most well-known works, including Abduction of the Sabine Women (1633-34) and Dance of Time (1636). He turned down governmental and religious initiatives in favour of working on private contracts as a result of Poussin’s newfound prominence.

As word of Poussin’s rising fame spread throughout Europe, he was approached for commissions by numerous prominent members of Parisian society. Such were the paintings The Triumph of Pan and The Triumph of Bacchus that were commissioned by Cardinal Richelieu (to be hung in his house rather than in a church). He turned down an offer to serve for King Louis XIII in Paris in 1639 because he didn’t want to leave Rome. Poussin arrived in France in December 1640 after leaving Italy solely on the King’s orders. When he was named the King’s First Painter, his primary responsibilities were decorating the royal palace, executing ideas for the Louvre’s Long Gallery, and painting altarpieces for the King and other members of his royal family and council. Poussin, who had a big staff working for him, got dissatisfied with the King’s bizarre requests and his lack of control. In 1642, Poussin was able to organise his return to Italy. In fact, when Richelieu died in December of that year and the King died just four months later, Poussin was free of any further obligations to the French court.

Late Life

When Poussin returned to Rome, he discovered that many of his previous customers had passed away, but he was nevertheless supported financially by an increasing number of French supporters. Poussin’s personality changed as he aged, becoming increasingly reclusive, cantankerous, and intolerant of other artists’ work. While working with French painter Charles Le Brun, he championed his work and did so for three years. Although the men’s emerging idea of art would prove contentious, Le Brun had a significant impact on Poussin’s viewpoint. As a representative of Poussin, Le Brun engaged Roger de Piles in a discussion on Poussin’s new approach to colour, which Le Brun dubbed the “Poussinist” approach to colour. Color would take a backseat in this technique, becoming secondary to the topic, and precursors might be seen in the work of artists who drew inspiration from antiquity (such as Raphael). De Piles favoured the work of Peter Paul Rubens, a Flemish artist who had studied Titian and Correggio for their more expressive use of arrangement and colour. Rubenists were considered the winners, but Poussin’s counter-position had a lasting impact on French painting’s future aesthetic debates.

Poussin’s health began to deteriorate about 1650. He continued to create four paintings a year, according to estimates, despite having hand tremors. Poussin focused on landscapes in the years before his death, including Landscapes with Pyramus and Thisbe (1651) and The Four Seasons (1660-1664), which were all finished in the last few years of his life. Poussin’s ambitious series depicted the changing seasons via the usage of Old Testament characters in each painting. Poussin’s extensive reading and pursuit of nuanced representation were notably evident in these works, which combined cultural and emotional richness with an appreciation for nature’s intrinsic harmony to generate works of art rich in cultural and emotional meaning.

Poussin’s health worsened swiftly after the loss of his wife in 1664, and he passed away in 1665 at the age of 71. With regard to burial arrangements, he made it clear in his last will and testament that he did not want anything over the top, in keeping with his lifelong interest in Stoic philosophy. The city of Rome mourned his passing, and a massive funeral procession was held at the church of San Lorenzo in Lucia, where the great adopted Frenchman was laid to rest.

The Neoclassicists, such as Jacques-Louis David and Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, were notably influenced by Poussin’s preference for mythology and natural forces above current events. For example, David meticulously examined his paintings to better understand how to incorporate figures into allegories from the past. David drew inspiration for The Oath of the Horatii (1784) from Poussin’s The Abduction of the Sabine Women while painting his masculine figures in The Oath of the Horatii (1784). A lovely landscape may be described as “Poustinesque” while looking at it, since Ingres thought Poussin was the first and only painter to represent the nature of Italy.

When it comes to contemporary artists of the 20th century, Poussin has been compared to the likes of Paul Cézanne and Cy Twombly, who both declared that Poussin’s paintings gave them “a better knowledge of who I am” Pablo Picasso, a painter who admired Poussin’s compositional perfection, was inspired by The Abduction of the Sabine Women. The 82-year-old Picasso created Rape of the Sabine Woman in 1963, a self-aware Cubist reworking of Poussin’s masterwork that was thought to be a reflection on the Cuban Missile Crisis. The American abstract painter Cy Twombly has cited Poussin in his work more lately, as did a number of other artists. Twombly drew influence from Greek and Roman mythology as well as ancient symbolism in his sparse abstract paintings, which unlike Poussin did not feature any characters or representational elements. Twombly’s Quattro Stagioni (1993-94), a cycle of four paintings depicting the seasons, may be seen as a modification of Poussin’s Les Quarte Saisons, as well. In reality, Twombly was following in the footsteps of Markus Lüpertz, who had created a sequence of works honouring Poussin between 1987 and 1990. Using Carolina Andrada Páez’s analysis of Poussin-Philoph (1990), for example, she argues that Lüpertz “discovered” a pictorial freedom “bound up with the mythological” through his interpretation of Poussin, and that Lüpertz’s postmodern “interpretation” of Poussin was “associated with Poussin’s sense of philosophical investigation,” which became “a contemporary theme” for future Lüpertz works.

Famous Art by Nicolas Poussin

Dance to the Music of Time

1634

During Poussin’s early years in Rome, the future Pope Clement IX Giulio Rospigliosi commissioned Dance to the Music of Time. also an accomplished opera librettist, and it has been suggested that the patron’s passion in music might be inferred from Rospigliosi’s painting (and dance). As an allegorical picture, however, it is often regarded as a masterpiece by Poussin. The four figures depict the wheel of human fortune: poverty, labour, riches, and pleasure. They reflect the passage of time and the cycles of life. Working one’s way out of poverty and into wealth, which in turn leads to fulfilment and enjoyment. Being spoilt by the excesses of pleasure, on the other hand, would only return you to abject poverty.

The Abduction of the Sabine Women

1637-1638

These young ladies are being taken by Roman troops in a scene of mass panic shown by Poussin (of which there are two variants). Poussin was inspired by Roman mythology while creating this dramatic and influential artwork (of which there are two versions). This is a well-known tale from the Renaissance, and numerous artists, such as Pietro da Cortona and the Frenchman Jacques Stella (who was a friend of Poussin’s) painted it during that time period. Poussin’s work has served as a study for a number of artists throughout the years. It is only after showing yourself a competent copyist that you should be authorised to draw anything from nature, such as a radish, from nature, wrote Edgar Degas in 1853.

Et In Arcadia Ego

1637

Rospigliosi also paid for Poussin’s most well-known work, The Arcadian Shepherds, which is also known as The Arcadian Shepherds. This pastoral picture has four shepherds gathered around a grave. An Arcadia is an idealised locale mentioned by the poet Virgil, which denotes a pleasant rural paradise. Poussin, on the other hand, juxtaposes this idyllic setting with the reality of a tomb. “Et in Arcadia Ego” (I am there, even in Arcadia) is traced by the crouching figure, emphasising that death has no boundaries, even in the most heavenly of settings. With his back turned, he seems astonished and worried as if he’s trying to reconcile his own mortality with the fact that he’s in this picture at all.

The Judgement of Solomon

1649

Solomon, Israel’s third king, was David’s son through Bathsheba and a wise man. When two prostitutes (who lived in the same home) gave birth at the same time, the Old Testament says that Solomon was summoned to govern. Women are fighting over the custody of a newborn after one of the babies died (its corpse is being carried by the lady on the right) (held up by the ankle, behind the woman on the left, by a sword wielding soldier). It’s Solomon’s will that the surviving kid will be divided in half (each woman taking a half). After hearing the verdict, the kid’s biological mother relinquishes her claim to the child to save the child’s life. As a result of this act, the wise King Solomon learns who the infant’s real mother is and the child is returned to her care.

Self-Portrait

1650

Paul Fréart de Chantelou, a friend and supporter of Poussin’s, asked him to paint a portrait for the French Academy’s establishment in 1648. Poussin agreed, but in light of his overall disdain for his Roman contemporaries, he decided to paint a picture of himself instead. In 1649, he created a first version based on a memento mori (a memorial to the deceased), but historians have been particularly intrigued by the second. Poussin is dressed in a black gown with his shoulders covered with a stole. In an almost full-face view, his posture is erect and his gaze is directed at us. The artist’s workshop is the location for this dramatic portrait.

Blind Orion Searching for the Rising Sun

1658

Poussin painted numerous spectacular “late” landscapes after being commissioned to paint Blind Orion by art collector and landscape painting aficionado Michel Passart. Landscape with Saint Jean at Patmos (1640), for example, has an air of calm and order. Light blues and dark contrasting hues were used in the older style’s colour scheme as well, resulting in works that felt composed and motionless. More unpredictable weather conditions were shown in Poussin’s later works with darker hues and eddying cloud shapes. Nature served as a vehicle for conveying tough or uncontrolled human emotions by showing the connection between it and the mind.

BULLET POINTED (SUMMARISED)

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• Nicolas Poussin, a Frenchman who worked in Rome for almost all of his adult life, is credited with starting the French classical aesthetic style.
• Ses paintings are renowned for their narrative intensity and scientific and orderly approach to composition, and he specialised in biblical, ancient history, and mythology subjects on them.
• Poussin is revered for his mastery of colour and his preference for the intellectual above the emotive in his work.
• Through his layering of meaning, he made paintings of great dramatic depth and allegorical intricacy, demonstrating that art could be an intellectual endeavour.
• With time, Poussin’s work evolved as he painted landscapes and a series of pantheistic allegories that used nature’s harmonious forces to communicate their meaning.
• The Neoclassical Jacques-Louis David and his followers championed Poussin’s style above all other Classicists, despite his reputation being lowered throughout the first half of the 18th century.
• Since then, Poussin’s fame has only grown.
• Poussin had shifted away from the expressive Mannerist style in the early 1630s and toward a more measured approach to composition.
• Classicism and Raphael gave Poussin his inspiration, while Venetian artist Titian showed his aim to utilise painting to transmit thoughts and ideals by fusing mythical and classical subjects.
• He aimed to arouse the viewer’s interest in his work by placing additional demands on their reflective abilities.
• Poussin devised and perfected a remarkably symmetrical strategy that he put into effect.
• Stoic Hellenic philosophy influenced his mathematical structure and visual allegory.
• Poussin aimed to transmit principles about human existence and experience that were common to all human beings.
• As a result of his belief that we are all subject to circumstances beyond our control, he advocated rational reasoning and personal self-discipline as the sole means to a happy life.
• Poussin used a darker palette and more free-form compositional forms in his later works to depict the interplay between the natural world and the human psyche.
• He used emotional landscape painting as a means of expressing human feelings that were either confused or uncontrolled.
• As a result, Poussin thought this would foster a deeper intellectual relationship between him and his audience members.

Information Citations

En.wikipedia.org, https://en.wikipedia.org/.

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