Painting and History: French Artists in 1848
Denys Sutton sees the revolutionary work of French artists reflected in the Spring of Nations.
“1848”, Professor Namier has observed, “was primarily the revolution of the intellectuals—la revolution des clercs.” Its insurrectionary spirit touched artists as well as writers. The avant-garde painter could not escape the preoccupation of his era, even if he was not always directly “engage”. Artists and critics may not have plunged into political action, though one of the defenders of the “new school”, Thore-Burger, was exiled for his part in the events of 1848, but their style corresponded to the general political current in French and European life. A counterpart of the Revolution of 1848 is thus to be found in the emergence of a new approach to painting.
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