Antoine Jean Gros (1771-1835), though a classicist by training, was
forced by circumstances, and by the patronage of Napoleon who ennobled
him, to devote his brush to an important phase of contemporary life—the
glorification of his hero’s warlike achievements. He was by no means a
realist; and although he followed Napoleon on many of his campaigns and
presumably brought back with him rich material in sketches and vivid
recollections, his forceful compositions accentuate the heroic aspect
and the imaginative appeal of warfare, and are not spontaneous glimpses
of actuality. The whole glamour of the Napoleonic legend is expressed
in the group of wounded soldiers who, oblivious of their suffering,
cheer their great captain in _Napoleon at the Battle of Eylau_ (No.
389). The sense of the heroic is as pronounced in the large painting,
_Napoleon visiting the Plague-stricken at Jaffa_ (No. 388), in the
_Bonaparte at Arcole_ (No. 391), and even in the impressive _Portrait
of Lieutenant-General Fournier-Sarlovèze_ (No. 392A), silhouetted
against a smoke-filled battlefield. A careful inspection of this large
canvas shows _pentimenti_ in the painting of the legs, of which the
General seems now to have two pair! Gros’s weakness, like that of all
David’s pupils, was his neglect of colour. His popularity waned rapidly
after the fall of Napoleon. He became a victim to melancholia, and
drowned himself in the Seine in 1835.