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The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of his Sons

1787
Not on view
This sheet is a compositional study for The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of His Sons (Musée du Louvre, Paris), which Jacques Louis David painted on the eve of the French Revolution and exhibited shortly after the fall of the Bastille in 1789. The subject, drawn from Roman history, found great resonance in the context of contemporary events. The canvas depicts an episode from the life of Lucius Junius Brutus, who put an end to the brutal regime of Tarquin, Rome's last king, and established the first Roman Republic, only later to find his two sons embroiled in a royalist conspiracy. True to his political convictions, Brutus condemned his sons to death. The novelty of David's painting is its focus, not on the executions but on the wrenching domestic aftermath.

David's fully formed Neoclassical style can be seen here in the clean geometry of the architectural setting, the arrangement of the figures in a relieflike plane, the linear treatment of the forms, and the cool monochrome palette. The furniture and accessories and the poses of the main figures, from the brooding Brutus at the left to his anguished wife and daughters at the right, are all based on antiquities David copied while he was a student in Rome.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of his Sons
  • Artist: Jacques Louis David (French, Paris 1748–1825 Brussels)
  • Date: 1787
  • Medium: Black chalk, pen and black and brown ink, brush and gray and brown wash, heightened with white gouache
  • Dimensions: Sheet: 13 1/16 x 16 9/16 in. (33.2 x 42.1 cm)
  • Classification: Drawings
  • Credit Line: Purchase, Lila Acheson Wallace Gift, 2006
  • Object Number: 2006.264
  • Curatorial Department: Drawings and Prints

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Study for The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of his Sons, Jacques Louis David French, Black chalk and brown ink on paper
Study for The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of his Sons
Jacques Louis David
ca. 1788
To David
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1831
Dedié au Prince Joseph frère ainé de Napoléon le Grand
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n.d.
Marat, As He Was At The Moment Of His Death
Jacques Louis David
Jacques Louis Copia
1793
Marat, As He Was At The Moment Of His Death
Jacques Louis David
Jacques Louis Copia
1793

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