(In the Museum at Toulouse)
Gérôme had a magic brush that permitted him to undertake all types of
painting with the same facility. This is how he so often happened to
treat subjects taken from antiquity and was able to render them in all
their classic beauty. It is not without interest to compare him, in
this style of painting, with Nicholas Poussin, whom he admired, and
with Puvis de Chavannes, whose method he execrated.]
He was haunted by a longing to visit Greece, and more especially the
Orient, with its marvellous skies, its resplendent colours, its
barbaric and motley races of men.
In 1853, in the company of a number of friends, he traversed Germany
and Hungary, planning a lengthy visit to Constantinople. Owing to the
war, he was forced to cut short his trip at Galatz. But he brought back
a collection of energetic and striking sketches of Russian soldiers,
which later served good purpose in his _Recreation in Camp, Souvenir
of Moldavia_. And in like manner, in all his distant journeyings,
he invariably showed the same eagerness to seize and transcribe his
original documents, content to let them speak for themselves, without
his having to distort them to fit the special purpose that he had in
view.
This painting found a place in the exposition of 1855, together with
_The Age of Augustus_, a notable achievement in which Gérôme revealed
the measure, if not of his true personality, at least of his lofty
conscience and his integrity as an artist enamoured of accuracy and
truth, even in the imaginary element inseparable from this type of
allegorical apotheosis. Notwithstanding a few dissenting opinions,
these two works were judged at their true value, and Gérôme received
the cross of the Legion of Honour.
At this time he was scarcely more than thirty years old. A most
brilliant career henceforth lay open before him.
Gérôme remains, beyond question, the unrivalled painter of Egypt, whose
aspects, enchanting and sinister alike, he has reproduced in a series
of pictures of finished workmanship and vibrant colouring.
It was in 1856 that, together with a few friends, among others
Bartholdi, then twenty-two years old, he undertook his long tour
through Egypt. To-day, one can go to Cairo or up the Nile as casually
as to Nice or Italy and with almost as little trouble. In those days
it was not a question of a simple excursion, of which any and every
amateur tourist would be capable, but of a veritable expedition.
Unforeseen adventures appealed to Gérôme, for he was brave, energetic,
and eager for new sensations. M. Frédéric Masson, the eminent
historian, who was one of his companions through the desert, has since
shown him to us, in a series of graphic recollections, as perpetually
on his feet, indefatigable, ready to endure any and every vicissitude
for the sake of sketching a site or a silhouette.
His stay in Egypt was for Gérôme a period of enchantment. He has
left, in regard to it, some hasty but expressive notes. He passed
four months on the Nile, well filled months, consecrated to fishing,
hunting, and painting, all the way from Diametta to Philae. He remained
the four succeeding months at Cairo, in an old dwelling that Suliman
Pasha rented to the young Frenchmen. "Happy epoch!" wrote the painter,
"Care-free, full of hope, and with the future before us. The sky was
blue."
He returned to Paris with an ample harvest of sketches, a supply of
curious, novel, and striking themes to work up. M. Moreau-Vauthier
shows him to us at that period of his existence, full of unflagging
energy and pleasant enthusiasm, in the company of Brion, Lambert,
Schutzenberger, and Toulmouche,--not to forget his monkey Jacques, who
took his place at the family table arrayed in coat and white cravat,
but would slink away and hide himself in shame when, as a punishment
for some misdeed, they decked him out as a ragpicker.
What jolly parties were held in that "Tea Chest," in which Gérôme then
had his studio, Rue de Notre-Dame-des-Champs! It was the scene of
many a festival, entertainment, and joyous puppet show, attended by
spectators such as Rachel (whose portrait Gérôme painted in 1861), her
sister, George Sand, Baudry, Cabanel, Hébert, and others.
This was, nevertheless, an epoch of prolific work and constant
research. Gérôme passed ceaselessly from one type of painting to
another; one might say that he rested from his exotic landscapes by
evoking, with an ever new lavishness of detail, curious or affecting
scenes from Greek and Roman antiquity.
Thus rewards and successes multiplied, and he experienced all the joys
of triumph. Already honorary member of the Academy of Besançon, he was
appointed professor at the École des Beaux-Arts in 1863, and in 1865,
member of the Institut, where he succeeded Heim.
Meanwhile he fought a duel with revolvers and was gravely wounded. His
mother hastened once again to his bedside and saved his life a second
time. Since the ball had passed through his right arm, complications
affecting his hand were feared. The artist declared that if necessary
he would learn to paint with his left. No sooner was he cured than off
he started again, bound for Egypt, whence he passed to Arabia and, more
venturesome than ever, continued on his way, as one of his biographers
phrased it, "making sketches clear to the summit of Mt. Sinai."
He was destined to make still other journeys, notably that of 1868
in company of Messrs. Bonnet, Frédéric Masson, and Lenoir; and his
companions paid tribute to his unfailing spirits and his powers of
endurance. But at the age of forty he married. The bride was Mlle.
Goupil, daughter of the well-known picture dealer.
He was a thorough man of the world and a favoured guest of the Duc
d'Aumale, who appreciated his ready wit and bought his _After the
Masquerade_ for the sum of 20,000 francs. In 1865 he received from the
Beaux-Arts and the Imperial Household an order for _The Reception of
the Siamese Ambassadors at Fontainebleau_.
Gérôme was also numbered among Compiègne's habitual visitors, along
with Berlioz, Gustave Doré, Guillaume, Merimée, Viollet-le-Duc, and
others. M. Moreau-Vauthier, who with pious zeal has collected the
more interesting anecdotes of his life, relates that he had a special
gift for organizing charades: he was scene setter and costumer. At
Fontainebleau, he took the Empress out alone in a row-boat.
Surrounded by devoted friends, such as Augier, Charles Blanc, Dumas,
Clery, his brother-in-law, Frémiet, Gérôme continued his laborious and
tranquil life in his vast atelier on the Boulevard de Clichy.
His days were passed in drawing and painting in his canvases. Towards
the end of the afternoon he would mount his horse and take a turn
in the Bois. He exhibited annually up to the year of the war. After
that, he lived in a sort of retirement until 1874, when, after a trip
to Algeria with G. Boulanger and Poilpot, he won a medal of honour.
_A Collaboration_, _Rex Tibicen_ (The King Flutist), and _His Gray
Eminence_, exhibited simultaneously, revealed him in full possession of
his ingenious and many-sided art.
New and resounding triumphs awaited him at the Exposition Universelle
of 1878, where he first revealed himself as a sculptor. As a matter
of fact, he had for a long time amused himself at modelling in clay.
He used to go to Frémiet's studio to do his modelling, and Frémiet,
by way of exchange, would come to paint in his. His two groups,
_Gladiators_ and _Anacreon, Bacchus and Cupid_, won him a second class
medal to take its place beside the medal of honour he had previously
received for his paintings. That same year, at the age of fifty-four,
he was raised to the rank of Commander. Cham expressed the joy of all
his friends by writing to him wittily: "I follow the example of your
ribbon, I fall upon your neck."
He was yet to gain still further honours: a first class medal as
sculptor, in 1881; to be declared _Hors Concours_ (Not entered for
Competition) at the Expositions of 1889 and 1900; and to be named Grand
Officer of the Legion of Honour.
From 1880 onward, excepting for a few flying visits to Spain and
Italy, Gérôme lived at his hotel in Paris, where he kept up a rather
lavish establishment, including horses and dogs, up to the time of the
successive deaths of his father and his son. It was the latter for
whose tomb he carved a touching figure of _Grief_.
[Illustration: PLATE IV.--POLLICE VERSO