How to find your own path? Thoughts on tradition and originality by 19th century French painter Ingres
French painter Ingres on why you should study the past, the role of the artist, and how to think about posterity. Food for thought from a 19th century neo-classical French painter
I stumbled upon a collection of notes based on Jean-Auguste Dominique Ingres’ views on painting, art and life —Écrits sur l’art (‘Writings on Art’). I love to dive into the mind’s life of creative people. In his notes, Ingres talks about his apprenticeships, the artists he admires, how you should choose your colors, the difficulties he faces in his work as well as his thoughts on old age… But as I closed the book, what stuck in my mind was his disdain of originality. Originality for originality’s sake has absolutely no value according to him.
This can easily be understood if we regard him as a conservative — being a neoclassical painter himself, he famously rivaled throughout his career the Romantic painter Delacroix, who was the rising star breaking traditional rules.
Ingres (1780–1867) was trained in the workshop of the very classical painter David. His admiration soon went to the Ancient Greeks and the painter he placed above…
