Before Manet, Monet, Renoir or Cezanne, Eugene Delacroix was the 19th century French painter challenging establishment notions of what qualifies as great art. Following a run through the spring and summer at the Musee de Louvre in Paris which drew over 500,000 visitors–a record for the museum–Delacroix’s time at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York runs out January 6, 2019.
Delacroix stands as the most historic, most written-about, most reported on and most buzz-generating art exhibit of 2018, on both sides of the Atlantic.
Never before has a comprehensive show devoted to Delacroix been staged in North America. If you miss these works now, many of which have never been on display in the U.S., it is likely you’ll never see them here again.
The two most prominent art museums in the world coming together to stage this show reinforces its importance.
Delacroix doesn’t warm viewers up with sketches, early work or smalls, it roars out of its corner throwing haymakers. The exhibit’s first gallery room places giant, tragic, dramatic, powerhouse, career-defining pictures opposite each other: Christ in the Garden of Olives (The Agony in the Garden) and Greece on the Ruins of Missolonghi.
Starting full throttle, Delacroix seldom eases off the gas through tigers, crucifixions, Faust, Morocco, war, nudes and an unforgettable self-portrait. More than 150 paintings, drawings, prints and manuscripts, both grandiose and intimate, sexual and religious, scandalous and heroic, leave visitors knowing they have seen something beyond special. This is a show guests and curators will remember 50 years from now.
Despite the innumerable gushing reviews for this show–of which this will be another–the name Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) is not as familiar to Americans the way the artists he influenced, a handful of them mentioned earlier in this article, are.
What makes Delacroix indispensable to art history, a figure whose influence and importance far exceeds his fame, is the link he represents between the art of so-called “old masters”–Titian, Rembrandt, Goya, et. al–and artists universally acknowledged, to this day, as modern–Manet, the Impressionists, Matisse–and all who followed. Art scholars regularly identify him as the bridge.
“Delacroix was a transformative figure in the history of European painting, and his influence significantly shaped what we think of today as modern.” Max Hollein, Director of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, said. “This exhibition is a rare opportunity to experience the breathtaking talent and remarkable scope of one of the most creative forces of the nineteenth century.”
Art history most commonly refers to Delacroix as a Romantic artist. A greater demonstration of how language changes over time will not be found. What we consider “romantic”–young lovers cooing at each other, cupids, tenderness–rarely surfaces in Delacroix's work. The early 19th century defined “Romanticism” by its drama, its high key emotional pitch, its favor for war and death and violence and shipwrecks and tragedy and grandeur and color and action; romantics freed their brush stroke in comparison to the fine, careful lines of the Neoclassical, Academic style which was then more popular.
You’ll find a full frontal assault of 19th century romanticism in Delacroix.
Lion attacks. Charging stallions colliding under a harsh North African sun. Blood. Sex. Medea moments from murdering her children as revenge on a cheating husband. Souls for sale.
Wonderful to observe, horrifying to imagine.
If possible, see Delacroix. If you already have, see it again. Remember this show. Remember its scale. Remember your emotional response.
Take advantage of The Met’s night time hours on Fridays and Saturdays or its special early morning preview hours when the galleries are quiet, affording you more uninterrupted time to contemplate favored pieces. Get up close. Closer. Then step back. Inspect these images with your visual fine-toothed comb, then let them wash over you.
Delacroix gave his life to his art. He never married. He worked long hours nearly until his death. He once remarked upon how he preferred eating only one meal per day. He never lost his focus or edge. He sacrificed for his art, which is now your art.
Delacroix gives you Delacroix, don’t miss this rare chance to take it.
Since you aren't Delacroix and don't limit yourself to one meal per day, less than a block north of The Met on 5th Avenue is another opportunity you should take advantage of: a meal at Cafe Sabarsky. Cafe Sabarsky is renowned across the city for its desserts and vintage Viennese cafe atmosphere. Art lovers will receive a double treat as the Cafe is located on the first floor the Neue Galerie which spotlights early 20th century German and Austrian art and is the home of Gustav Klimt's Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer, the famed "Woman in Gold."
