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| Ingres |
The boy's talent for music seemed promising at first. In 1791 he entered the Royal Academy of Arts in Toulouse where he studied art, sculpture and landscape painting. In 1796 Ingres went to Paris for 4 years to study under Jacques-Louis David.
He won the Grand Prix in 1801 and parted company from David over a difference of opinion on style. Ingres's style was more flat and linear, and focused on contour. In 1802 he exhibited Girl after bathing and in 1804 a Portrait of the First Consul.
His works produced a disturbing impression on the public. His talent, his power of literal rendering and the purity of his line were generally acknowledged; but he was reproached with a desire to be singular and extraordinary. In 1815 Ingres had made many projects for treating a subject from the life of the celebrated Duke of Alva, a commission from the family, but an aversion for this family grew upon him, and finally he abandoned the task. During all these years Ingres's reputation in France did not increase. The interest his work arised soon died away; not only was the public indifferent, but amongst other artists Ingres found little recognition. The strict classicists looked upon him as an apostate. Eugène Delacroix and other leaders of the romantic movement for which Ingres always expressed the deepest abomination, seem to have been the only ones sensible of his merits.