Jacques-Louis David
La Mort de Marat

In a previous review, I had the opportunity to talk about an artist like Whistler, a firm believer that art should have as both its inspiration and ultimate purpose only itself and not be tempted by extrinsic, social, political, or cultural allure: in a certain sense, history has handed us the painter I am going to talk about as the exact opposite, making him the model and ultimate example of "politicized" and "historicized" painting. In this writing, I will do nothing to distance myself from this, perhaps not entirely, cliché but, beyond the biography, which I will attach to the review, of David, limiting oneself to seeing the great French artist only as a visual narrator before the French Revolution and then of the Napoleonic Era would be unjust and quite limited.

In almost sixty years of artistic activity, Jacques-Louis David indeed covered the transition from Rococo to Neoclassicism: of the latter style, he was among the greatest exponents, countless artists were influenced by him both during his life and after his passage, as are the many fierce debates on all aspects of his art, from the ethical to the purely technical. Saying that David is the French Neoclassical is not entirely incorrect but, to return to the beginning, to truly understand his figure, both historical and artistic, one should weave an entire historiographical and philosophical discourse on the Enlightenment, the fall of the Ancien Régime, the Revolution, the Napoleonic illusion, and the Restoration that for reasons of space I will not do but it is good not to even attempt to separate the man from both art and politics, remembering, however, that often ethical parameters depend on the historical period being discussed and comparing them to those of the present is, almost, always wrong.

"The Death of Marat," oil on canvas from 1793 housed at the Royal Museum of Fine Arts of Brussels, was created by David after an artistic period that saw him, thanks to a trip to Italy, especially Rome and Naples, abandon the then gasping Rococo to embrace a new style which, in the years to follow, was labeled as Neoclassical but which in the '70s and '80s of the eighteenth century, in the full twilight of the Ancien Régime, was called "Vrai Style": "The Oath of the Horatii" from 1785 is a shining example of painting that anticipates social and political themes, soon destined to dominate, becoming unintentionally iconic, but also a masterpiece of a summation of both ancient and Renaissance artistic themes. A powerful work destined to influence both Enlightenment painting and its requiem: I have already spoken about Goya elsewhere. I mention this painting because it was the true and proper "manifesto", even if David specified that he wanted no political connotations which were attributed by others, of an artist who, fervently embraced revolutionary ideals, dedicated soul and body to the iconographic narration of that tumultuous period straddling the 1700s and 1800s.

The assassination of Jean-Paul Marat deeply affected David, on one hand, because accounts tell of a sincere friendship between the two and on the other because the victim was a representative of that intransigent Jacobin wing to which the painter was close: this emotion is evident in the painting. The first thing noticed is the absolute simplicity of the depicted scene: a man lying sideways, agonizing, in a tub, with a grimace on his face reminiscent of an enigmatic smile, holding in one hand a letter signed by the murderess. David doesn't even depict her in the artwork, almost as if to divert responsibility elsewhere, barely acknowledging the executor and leaving the instigators to stew in their own broth. No frills to embellish the place, apart from a writing desk, made from a wooden crate, with a simple dedication at the base, and writing materials, above and scattered in the room: probably the artist, by rendering the context sparse, wanted to pay homage to Marat's moral stature and honesty. The light and shadow recall Caravaggio's dramatic ability in rendering sacred contexts: clearly David's attempt to present the assassinated as a secular icon and martyr of the Revolution and Enlightenment values, in contrast to the weary figures of Christian tradition and obsolete ecclesiastical dogmas. The technique used is, almost, obsessively precise and clean with multiple references to Classicism, especially Greek. With this painting, David civilly sanctifies, without divinizing him, a man and lays the foundation for a new kind of faith: secular, founded on the principles of reason and solidarity among people. 

The painting was quite undervalued, especially for, imaginable, political reasons, by contemporaries but was later re-evaluated so much that it was revisited in painting, even in diametrically opposed styles, and in other art forms.