Auguste Jal,The Artist and the Philosopher: Critical Conversations on the Salon of 1824
From Elizabeth Gilmore Holt, The Triumph of Art for the Public: The Emerging Role of Exhibitions and Critics (Gerden City New York: Anchor Books, 1979),pp.245-246.
| This description of the classical ideal in art was written a quarter century before our period begins, but it represents an attitude towards culture that was still very much alive in the world of the French Academy at mid-century. Jal was a critic writing during the Bourbon monarchy (1815-1830) and the July Monarchy (1830-1848). Here is part of the review that he wrote of the official 1824 Salon. |
August 24, 1824
You love the arts and you know how I love them, my friend. I
see them as a civilizing agent and a means of perfecting the social
order, and it makes me very angry to see their power ignored today. The
moral aim of painting is very dear to my heart. I do not believe that
people are sufficiently concerned with it and this makes me very unhappy.
One virtuous act well depicted can make more impression on a people's
spirit than having the story of that act repeated a hundred times. I am
sorry to see subjects without a moral, absurd traditions, frivolities of
more than one sort adopted by some artists whose brushes would be
ennobled by being consecrated to the great historical incidents
of their country; at least they would serve to arouse the
patriotism of its citizens, the filial heroism, the maternal devotion, the passion for work and order, the love of discovery and improvement,
industrious competition -- in a word, all the generous impulses which make
a society great but whose neglect diminishes it. An impressive development
can already be noticed in France; the glory of our arms and the enterprise of our industry have placed us in the front rank among
nations; let the arts, following the direction taken by
literature, complete our moral education, and we will leave to posterity a
moving inheritance that will combine the memory of those virtues and values
which have made us the equal of the ancients and the tradition of important
achievements and valuable inventions which have made us the most
advanced nation in civilization.
You see, my friend, what I expect from art. I would hope that the capable men who cultivate the arts would understand that and be willing to enter into a path along which there is so much honor to be gained. May this year's Salon show us that they are on this track!
B.Perat,Varnishing Painting at the Salon (Paris1866)