France
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Théodore Géricault
Rouen, Normandy, France
Archival Overview
Pioneering French Romantic painter whose dramatic tour de force The Raft of the Medusa launched the Romantic movement.
Biographical Record
Jean-Louis André Théodore Géricault was an influential French painter and lithographer who spearheaded the Romantic revolt against rigid Neoclassicism. Possessed by a passionate love for horses, martial valor, and extreme human emotional states, Géricault broke established taboos by confronting contemporary tragedies rather than ancient mythology.
His monumental masterpiece The Raft of the Medusa (1819) depicted the desperate survivors of an infamous royal navy shipwreck resorting to cannibalism. Géricault spent months studying severed limbs in morgues and interviewing survivors to capture the sheer visceral horror. His compassionate late portraits of the mentally ill (The Monomaniacs) remain unparalleled in psychological depth. He died tragically young at age 32.
Key Life Milestones
The Raft of the Medusa
Exhibited his epic 16-by-23-foot canvas at the Paris Salon, shocking conservative critics and inaugurating French Romanticism.
Portraits of the Insane (Les Monomanes)
Painted a series of ten penetrating portraits of asylum inmates, pioneering clinical psychological empathy in art.
Memorial Guestbook & Tributes
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Final Resting Place
Perpetual MemorialParis, France