Georges de La Tour (Vic-sur-Seille, near Nancy, Lorraine, March 13, 1593-Lunéville, January 30, 1652), was a French Baroque painter. He was a famous painter during his lifetime, although after his death he fell into oblivion until the 20th century, when his work was rediscovered by several researchers, especially the art historian Hermann Voss.
Georges de La Tour's Life
He was born in Vic-sur-Seille (Lorraine), the second of seven children of a tahonier, Jean de La Tour, and a baker's daughter, Sibylle Mélian. Vic was an episcopal town, belonging to the bishop of Metz (and therefore to France, despite being in the territory of the Duchy of Lorraine, then independent), and was a Catholic center in the midst of the Protestantism of the region. The Duke of Lorraine was at war with the King of France.
He was formed in Nancy, the capital of Lorraine. It is not known if he remained in his homeland all his life, knowing the work of the Italian and Dutch tenebrists through the circulation of artists and works, or if he traveled to Italy and the Netherlands, as these trips are not clearly documented. If they did take place, the dates 1610-1615 are given for his trip to Rome and 1615-1620 for Utrecht.
In 1616 he returned to Vic, and the following year he married the noblewoman Diane Le Nerf, daughter of a treasurer of the Duke of Lorraine. In 1619 their first son, Philippe, was born, but he lived only a short time.
In 1620 he settled in Lunéville, capital of the region, and took on an apprentice, Claude Baccarat. The following year his son Étienne was born. In 1623 he received several commissions from Duke Henri II. Between 1625 and 1630 was a period of prosperity, with abundant work, the birth of several more children and the addition of more apprentices.
From 1630 onwards hardships began: the region of Lorraine was in dispute between France and Austria, so the French and imperial armies crossed and devastated it several times.
Between 1631 and 1635 it suffered the effects of the Thirty Years' War: riots, epidemics such as the plague, militia raids, outlaws and rebellions, as well as the fire of Lunéville (1638). In 1636 he took on a new apprentice, his nephew François Nardoyen. Around 1639 he seems to have gone to Paris, since in a document of the time he is mentioned as "official painter to the king" (Louis XIII).
He returned to Lunéville in 1643, where he admitted another apprentice, Chrétien George. From that year until his death he was in charge of making a painting every year on behalf of the city of Lunéville for the French governor, Henri de La Ferté-Senneterre (the duke was in exile).
From 1646 he was associated with his son Étienne, also a painter. The following year, a document relating to his son's marriage names him as "painter endowed with a royal pension". In 1648 he took on another apprentice, Jean-Nicolas Didelot, the only one who showed some skill; the contract stipulated that he would also serve as a page and model.
On the occasion of the plague epidemic, in 1652 the artist and his wife died, as well as a servant of the house. Of his ten children, only three survived: Étienne, Claude and Chrétienne. Étienne practiced as a painter for a time, but then abandoned that activity to focus on the administration of his properties, and later became mayor of Lunéville.
A much sought-after painter during his lifetime, he later fell into oblivion. He was recovered between the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century by the studies of several researchers: Alexandre Joly, Luc-Olivier Merson, Hermann Voss and Pierre Landry.
At the 1934 exhibition of the Painters of Reality in Paris (the term by which several French realist artists of the early 17th century are known, such as La Tour, Philippe de Champaigne, Nicolas Tournier, Valentin de Boulogne, the Le Nain brothers, etc.), Charles Sterling presented a catalog of thirteen works.
In 1948, a doctoral thesis dedicated to the artist, by François-Georges Pariset, already included several dozen paintings, while the first retrospective exhibition dedicated to the painter, held in Paris in 1972, consigned 31 originals. Today, about 70 works are attributed to him, in addition to several unverified attributions.
Georges de La Tour's Style
He is the most famous of the French tenebrists. Georges de La Tour was influenced by the Italian painter Caravaggio, and must also have known the work of Carlo Saraceni and Orazio Gentileschi.
However, he is more closely related to the Dutch tenebrists of the Utrecht school - in particular Gerard van Honthorst - than to Caravaggio. In Georges de La Tour's paintings, the origin of the light is concrete: a candle, a spark plug, a torch or another form of artificial light, while in Caravaggio's works, the light came from a spotlight of imprecise origin.
He treated religious themes, genre and devotional scenes, all in the same style, to the point that in some paintings it is not easy to distinguish whether it is one or the other, as can be seen in The Newborn, which is not known if it really represents the Nativity.
Among the religious themes, he painted with preference saints associated with the plague, specialists in preventing the contagion, hence his various representations of St. Sebastian, who was also a military man. He did not, however, deal with the theme of the Passion.
There is no record that he made portraits, but he preferred to represent humble people, especially serious, restrained, pious female figures: women healing the wounded, young mothers with children, several Magdalenas.
His style is very personal. The composition is balanced and rigorous, almost geometric.
His work has two stages: the "diurnal" paintings of the first period and the "nocturnal" ones of the second.
The first period lasts until 1638, with famous paintings of gamblers and soldiers, reflecting a little the reality of his native Lorraine, where soldiers playing with rogues abounded. An intermediate phase is marked by his stay in Paris (1638-1643).
His second period began when he returned to Lunéville in 1643. He then painted nocturnal paintings in which night lights predominate (e.g. St. Joseph the carpenter, on this page).
The lighting, which generally comes from a candle, illuminates the figures with white or reddish light. The rest of the painting is left in darkness, with no landscapes or architecture. He uses a practically monochromatic palette: red and black in the night scenes, white and purple in the day scenes.
Georges de La Tour's Work
About 80 compositions were attributed to him, although the most demanding catalogs reduce them to half and consider the rest as copies. Its dating is not certain. From the first period it is worth mentioning:
- The Pea Eaters, Berlin Museum.
- Old Man, before July 1624, M. H. de Young Memorial Museum, San Francisco.
- Elderly woman, before July 1624, M. H. de Young Memorial Museum, San Francisco.
- Hurdy-gurdy with dog, Municipal Museum, Bergues.
- St. James the Less, Musée Toulouse-Lautrec, Albi
- Musicians' Quarrel, ca. 1625-1630 (?), J. Paul Getty Museum at the Getty Center in Malibu.
- Penitent Saint Jerome (with cardinal's hat), National Museum, Stockholm, 153 x 106 cm. There is another penitent St. Jerome in the Grenoble Museum.
- St. Jerome reading a letter, found in the Cervantes Institute and deposited in the Prado Museum.
- St. Thomas, Toulouse-Lautrec Museum, Albi
- The Trickster with the Ace of Clubs, private collection, Geneva
- The Trickster, ca. 1625, Musée du Louvre, Paris. Also known as The Cheaters and Cheat of the Ace of Diamonds.
- The Fortune Teller, ca. 1630, oil on canvas, 101.9 x 123.5 cm, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Also known as The Fortune Teller.
- Hurdy-gurdy player, ca. 1631-1636 (?), oil on canvas, 162 x 105 cm, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Nantes. Also known as The fly player.
- Hurdy-gurdy player, in profile (Blind man playing the hurdy-gurdy), Museo del Prado.
Second period:
- The blower of the lamp, Museum of Fine Arts, Dijon.
- The Thought of St. Joseph, (ca. 1640), Museum of Fine Arts, Nantes.
- St. Joseph the Carpenter, (ca. 1642), oil on canvas, 132 x 98 cm (other sources: 137 x 101 cm), Musée du Louvre, Paris.
- Penitent Magdalene, called Magdalene Fabius, National Gallery of Art, Washington.
- Penitent Magdalene, called Magdalene Terff, ca. 1642-1644, oil on canvas, 128 x 94 cm, Musée du Louvre, Paris.
- Penitent Magdalene, called Magdalene Wrightsman, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
- The Adoration of the Shepherds (ca. 1644), oil on canvas, 107 x 137 cm, Musée du Louvre, Paris.
- The Newborn (1645-1648), oil on canvas, 76 x 91 cm, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rennes. Enigmatic painting, which is not known if it represents, in reality, a Nativity with the Virgin Mary, the baby Jesus and St. Anne. It is bathed in a reddish light.
- Job scorned by his wife, Musée provincial des Vosges, Épinal. Also known as Job mocked by his wife.
- Saint Sebastian cared for by Saint Irene or Saint Sebastian assisted by Saint Irene. There are several versions, notably the one in the Louvre Museum in Paris and the one in Berlin. The latter is believed to be the later dated version. It measures 160 x 129 cm.
- The Tears of St. Peter (1645), Cleveland Museum of Art. One of the few paintings by La Tour to bear a date and signature.
- St. Alexius (1648), now lost.
- The denial of St. Peter (1650), Museum of Fine Arts, Nantes. Also dated and signed.
- Woman of the Flea, Musée Historique Lorraine, Nancy.