09.25.2015-12.31.2015
Jean-Pierre Saint-Ours
A genevan Painter in the Europe of the Enlightenment
The Musée d’Art et d’Histoire of Geneva pays tribute to this great artist whose name decorates the building’s facade and whose major work Le Tremblement de terre entered the Geneva collection in 1801 already.
This new retrospective shines a light on this historical and portrait painter who worked in an original Neoclassical style. After training in Paris and traversing a Baroque phase, Saint-Ours joined the “return to Antiquity” movement in pursuit of a new classicism through inspiration from the Ancients. After spending twelve years in Rome where his compositions enjoyed great success, he returned to a politically troubled Geneva to defend the homeland. Encouraged by his fellow citizens, he developed the ideas he inherited from the Enlightenment on the role of the fine arts and painted historiated portraits of prominent members of Geneva’s cultural, scientific and political circles.
Centred on the large Neoclassical paintings from his time in Rome, Les Mariages germains , Le Choix des enfants de Sparte , and Les Jeux olympiques , the exhibit features some one hundred paintings including some never previously shown, along with a considerable number of original studies. The display precedes the publication of the catalogue raisonné of his painted works, prepared by Anne de Herdt.