1762 -1834 · Lille, Paris, Florence, Rome and Napoleonic Italy

Student of David, portraitist of the Bonapartes and great collector, Jean-Baptiste Wicar links French neoclassicism and Italian culture.

Jean-Baptiste Joseph Wicar was born in Lille in 1762. Son of a cabinetmaker and a schoolteacher, he attended the city's free drawing school at a very young age before obtaining a scholarship to Paris. He entered the studio of Jacques-Louis David in 1782 and accompanied him to Rome in 1785. His precise drawing, his taste for line and his knowledge of Antiquity were formed through contact with the master and the Italian collections. From 1787, Wicar participated in a vast enterprise of copying the works of the Uffizi gallery. From 1787, Wicar participated in a vast enterprise of copying the works of the Uffizi gallery. His precise drawing, his taste for line and his knowledge of Antiquity were formed through contact with the master and the Italian collections. From 1787, Wicar participated in a vast enterprise of copying the works of the Uffizi gallery. His precise drawing, his taste for line and his knowledge of Antiquity were formed through contact with the master and the Italian collections. From 1787, Wicar participated in a vast enterprise of copying the works of the Uffizi gallery. His precise drawing, his taste for line and his knowledge of intervenes in the French artistic administration in Italy, an activity today inseparable from the context of seizures and transfers of works. He then settled permanently in Rome and worked for the Bonaparte family. The portraits of Caroline Bonaparte, Joseph Bonaparte and Murat combine facial accuracy, official costume and political authority. His great historical paintings, such as Electra Receiving the Ashes of Orestes or The Resurrection of the Son of Naïm's Widow, seek monumental readability. His great historical paintings, such as Electra Receiving the Ashes of Orestes or The Resurrection of the Son of Naïm's Widow, seek monumental readability. In this last work, completed in 1816, the crowd, gestures and architecture lead to the central miracle. Wicar is also a major collector of drawings elders. His legacy in Lille, including sheets by Raphael and his entourage, lastingly transformed the museum of his hometown. Died in Rome in 1834, he embodies both the neoclassical painter and the collector of collections between France and Italy. The "Jean-Baptiste Wicar" selection notably compares The Resurrection of the Son of Naïm's Widow and Electra receiving Orestes' ashes. His reading favors composition.

Wicar looks at painting as a designer and a collector: each figure is a thought-out outline, each gesture a transformed quote from Antiquity or Raphael.