Description
A leading figure of the French Romantic movement, Delacroix painted traditional historical subjects, but in a dramatic, expressive manner. The Greek struggle for independence from the Ottoman Empire in the 1820s caught the imagination of numerous French artists, who identified the Greek cause with their own revolution thirty years earlier. Like British Romantic poets, French artists regarded the Greek war of independence as a struggle for the survival of Western democracy and Christian civilization.
Provenance
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Accession Number
1916.1032
Medium
oil on fabric
Dimensions
Framed: 76 x 87.5 x 7.5 cm (29 15/16 x 34 7/16 x 2 15/16 in.); Unframed: 50.4 x 61.5 cm (19 13/16 x 24 3/16 in.)
Classification
Painting
Credit Line
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. J. H. Wade
Tags
Painting Impressionist & Modern (1851–1900) Oil Painting French
Background & Context
Background Story
Greek Cavalry Men Resting in Forest from 1858 is one of Delacroix's late works on a subject drawn from the Greek War of Independence (1821-29), the conflict that had inspired his most famous painting, The Massacre at Chios (1824). The 1858 date places this more than three decades after the Greek War, but the subject continued to fascinate Delacroix throughout his career. The cavalry men resting in a forest are rendered with the vigorous brushwork and rich color that distinguish Delacroix's late style, and the forest setting allows him to exercise his talent for landscape within the framework of a military subject.
Cultural Impact
Delacroix's late paintings on Greek War subjects are important because they show his continuing engagement with the Orientalist and military subjects that had defined his early career. Greek Cavalry Men Resting in Forest demonstrates that Delacroix's interest in the Greek War was not limited to his youthful masterpiece but continued to inspire him throughout his life, with the forest setting allowing his landscape talent to combine with his military subject.
Why It Matters
Greek Cavalry Men Resting in Forest is late Delacroix returning to the Greek War subject that had inspired his early masterpiece: cavalrymen in a forest rendered with the vigorous brushwork and rich color of his late style. The 1858 painting shows that the Greek War continued to inspire Delacroix more than three decades after his first treatment of the subject.
