1859 -1938 · Salon, symbolism, spectacular history and Algeria

Monumental battles, tragic heroines, Wagnerian flowers and sumptuous settings make Georges-Antoine Rochegrosse a director of fin-de-siecle painting.

Georges-Antoine Rochegrosse was born in Versailles in 1859 and grew up in a literary environment linked to the poet Théodore de Banville, his father-in-law. He studied at the Académie Julian with Jules Lefebvre and Gustave Boulanger, then began at the Salon in 1882. His first large canvases responded to the Third Republic's taste for spectacular history. Andromache, Attila and the Huns or the scenes of Antiquity accumulate bodies, armor, fabrics and architecture in order to place the spectator as close as possible to the catastrophe. Andromache, Attila and the Huns or the scenes of Antiquity accumulate bodies, armor, fabrics and architecture in order to place the spectator as close as possible to the catastrophe. Andromache, Attila and the Huns or the scenes of Antiquity accumulate bodies, armor, fabrics and architecture in order to place the spectator as close as possible to the catastrophe. Andromache, Attila and the Huns or the scenes of Antiquity accumulate bodies, armor, fabrics and architecture in order to place the spectator as close as possible to the catastrophe. Andromache, Attila and the Huns or the scenes of Antiquity accumulate bodies, armor, theater decorator; this circulation between book, stage and painting reinforces his sense of entry, costume and scale. In the 1890s, he got closer to symbolism. The Knight of Flowers, inspired by Wagner's Parsifal, contrasts the hero's silver armor with the carnal profusion of flower girls. The composition retains the realism of the Salon, but the vegetation, temptation and the march towards the ideal move the story towards an inner vision. From the end of the century, Rochegrosse frequently stayed in Algeria and then settled in El Biar. From the end of the century, Rochegrosse frequently stayed in Algeria and then settled in El Biar. He painted gardens, odalisques and scenes inspired by his environment. These works belong to the history of orientalism french and must be viewed with the necessary critical distance from colonial projections and exotic stagings. He still designed posters, tapestry boxes, illustrations and sets until the 1930s. Died in El Biar in 1938, Rochegrosse linked academy, symbolism and performing arts in a work dominated by the power of staging. The "Georges-Antoine Rochegrosse" selection notably compares The Knight of Flowers and Andromache. His reading favors the story.

Rochegrosse composes like a theater director: costume, body, decor and light converge towards the moment when the story becomes a spectacle.