Philippe Jacques de Loutherbourg

1 portrait

© National Portrait Gallery, London

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Philippe Jacques de Loutherbourg

by Philippe Jacques de Loutherbourg
oil on canvas, 1805-1810
50 in. x 40 in. (1270 mm x 1016 mm)
Purchased, 1931
Primary Collection
NPG 2493

On display in Room 18 on Floor 3 at the National Portrait Gallery

Sitterback to top

Artistback to top

Linked publicationsback to top

  • Smartify image discovery app
  • Ingamells, John, National Portrait Gallery: Mid-Georgian Portraits 1760-1790, 2004, p. 140
  • Rideal, Liz, Insights: Self-portraits, 2005, p. 30 Read entry

    Born in Strasbourg, De Loutherbourg trained in Paris. He was a protégé of Denis Diderot (1713-84) and a member of the Académie Royale. Here he portrays himself as fashionably dressed in knee-length breeches – long trousers (pantaloons) were not acceptable court wear before 1815. His confident and distinguished demeanour compels the viewer to appreciate his talent. Having arrived in England from France in 1771, De Loutherbourg’s palette is both patriotic and symbolic – Napoleon had standardised the colour of the French flag in 1804.

  • Saywell, David; Simon, Jacob, Complete Illustrated Catalogue, 2004, p. 172

Events of 1805back to top

Current affairs

Nelson's state funeral is held at St Paul's. An occasion for an outpouring of national grief and patriotism, the grand ceremony built on the cult of Nelson which had emerged in the years before his death.

Art and science

Mary Tighe publishes Pysche or the Legend of Love, a romantic allegory in the fashionable medieval revival style, admired by both Keats and Shelley.
The 'poems of Ossian' are officially declared a fake and a great literary scandal ends as Scottish poet James Macpherson is exposed as the forger of the third century bard's epic works.

International

Battle of Trafalgar. Napoleon's ultimate plan to invade England from Boulogne with 100,000 men is thwarted by superior British naval power. Nelson dies in the closing moments of battle having been wounded by a French sniper, but survives long enough to learn that a decisive victory has been won.

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