Timeline

1748 Jacques-Louis David is born on August 30.

1766 Begins studying at the French Royal Academy, where he achieves the title of peintre d’histoire (history painter), charged with creating epic visual narratives drawn from ancient history, literature, and myth.

1774 David is awarded the Prix de Rome.

1775 Travels to the prestigious French Academy in Rome, where he refines his technique by drawing the city’s ancient, Renaissance, and Baroque art and architectural treasures. It is here that the young David sharpens his classical aesthetic. During his five years in Rome, David produces over 1,000 sketches that serve as his inspiration throughout his life.

1780 Returns to Paris and begins a fruitful decade as one of the country’s top painters, building a successful career under a system of royal and aristocratic patronage. His work during this period is dominated by large- scale monumental paintings.

1785 Achieves success at the Paris Salon with The Oath of Horatii, a commission from Louis XVI.

1789 The storming of the Bastille signals the start of the French Revolution, which would ultimately bring down the Bourbon monarchy and the system of aristocratic privileges. Although the Revolution destabilized the patronage system that sustained his career, David welcomes the movement and becomes an active political participant.

1792–94 During the Terror, the Revolution’s most militant phase led by Maxmilien Robespierre, David plays a major role as the head of the Committee for General Security, which guillotined those perceived to be against their revolutionary cause. In 1793, David votes for the death of Louis XVI, who had once been a patron.

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1794 David is imprisoned after a coup by moderate revolutionaries, bringing an end to the Terror with the execution of Robespierre. A new, elected government emerges.

1795 David returns to public life, taking a large studio in the Louvre and reprising his role as one of the country’s most influential artists. He turns away from overt politics and focuses on portraits.

1797 David meets Napoleon, marking the start of his long association with the general.

1799 Napoleon seizes power in a coup d’etat, naming himself First Consul and returning France to dictatorial rule.

1800 Napoleon rushes across the Alps in record time to fend off an Austrian attack on Northern Italy. David’s painting Bonaparte Crossing the Alps at Grand-Saint-Bernard immortalizes Napoleon as a mighty general, and becomes emblematic of Napoleonic power, as it still is today.

1804 Napoleon establishes an imperial government and crowns himself emperor. For the next 10 years Napoleon’s court dictates French social mores, values, and tastes in a bold attempt to refashion the world according to a Napoleonic distillation of the ideal empires of the ancient past. This includes the introduction of the Napoleonic code, the civil code, which forms the basis of French law to this day.

1815 Napoleon’s reign comes to an end and the Bourbon monarchy is restored.

1816 David is banished and flees to Brussels, where he spends the last 10 years of his life painting and teaching. During this period he returns to mythological subjects and intimate portraiture, continuing to paint for members of the Bonaparte family who were also living in exile.

1825 David dies on December 29 in Brussels at the age of 77.

# # # Note to editors: Images available on request.

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