at Saint-Germain-en-Laye on the 29th of August 1876. If David can scarcely be placed in the first rank of French composers, he nevertheless deserves the consideration due to a sincere artist, who was undoubtedly inspired by lofty ideals. At a time when the works of Berlioz were still unappreciated by the majority of people, David succeeded in making the public take interest in music of a picturesque and descriptive kind. Thus he may be considered as one of the pioneers of modern French musical art.
DAVID, GERARD [Gheeraert Davit], (?–1523), Netherlands painter, born at Oudewater in Holland between 1450 and 1460, was the last great master of the Bruges school. He was only rescued from complete oblivion in 1860–1863 by Mr W. J. H. Weale, whose researches in the archives of Bruges brought to the light the main facts of the master’s life. We have now documentary evidence that David came to Bruges in 1483, presumably from Haarlem, where he had formed his early style under the tuition of Ouwater; that he joined the gild of St Luke at Bruges in 1484 and became dean of the gild in 1501; that he married in 1496 Cornelia Cnoop, daughter of the dean of the Goldsmiths’ gild; became one of the leading citizens of the town; died on the 13th of August 1523; and was buried in the Church of Our Lady at Bruges. In his early work he had followed the Haarlem tradition as represented by Dirck Bouts, Ouwater and Geertgen of Haarlem, but already gave evidence of his superior power as colourist. To this early period belong the “St John” of the Kaufmann collection in Berlin, and Mr Salting’s “St Jerome.” In Bruges he applied himself to the study and the copying of the masterpieces by the Van Eycks, Van der Weyden, and Van der Goes, and came under the direct influence of the master whom he followed most closely, Hans Memlinc. From him he acquired the soulful intensity of expression, the increased realism in the rendering of the human form and the orderly architectonic arrangement of the figures. Yet another master was to influence him later in life when, in 1515, he visited Antwerp and became impressed with the life and movement of Quentin Matsys, who had introduced a more intimate and more human conception of sacred themes. David’s “Pietà” in the National Gallery, and the “Descent from the Cross,” in the Cavallo collection, Paris (Guildhall, 1906), were painted under this influence and are remarkable for their dramatic movement. But the works on which David’s fame will ever rest most securely are the great altar-pieces executed by him before his visit to Antwerp—the “Marriage of St Catherine,” at the National Gallery; the triptych of the “Madonna Enthroned and Saints” of the Brignole-Sale collection in Genoa; the “Annunciation” of the Sigmaringen collection; and, above all, the “Madonna with Angels and Saints” which he painted gratuitously for the Carmelite Nuns of Sion at Bruges, and which is now in the Rouen museum. Only a few of his works have remained in Bruges—“The Judgment of Cambyses,” “The Flaying of Sisamnes” and the “Baptism of Christ” in the Town museum, and the “Transfiguration” in the Church of Our Lady. The rest were scattered all over the world, and to this may be due the oblivion into which his very name had fallen—partly to this, and partly to the fact that with all the beauty and soulfulness of his work he had no new page to add to the history of the progressive development of art, and even in his best work only gave new variations of the tunes sung by his great precursors and contemporaries. That he is worthy to rank among the masters was only revealed to the world when a considerable number of his paintings were assembled at Bruges on the occasion of the exhibition of early Flemish masters in 1902. At the time of his death the glory of Bruges, and also of the Bruges school, was on the wane, and Antwerp had taken the leadership in art as in political and commercial importance. Of David’s pupils in Bruges, only Isenbrandt, A. Cornelis and Ambrosius Benson achieved importance. Among other Flemish painters Joachim Patinir and Mabuse were to some degree influenced by him.
Eberhard Freiherr von Bodenhausen published in 1905 a very comprehensive monograph on Gerard David and his School (Munich, F. Bruckmann), together with a catalogue raisonné of his works, which, after careful sifting, are reduced to the number of forty-three. (P. G. K.)
DAVID, JACQUES LOUIS (1748–1825), French painter, was
born in Paris on the 30th of April 1748. His father was killed in
a duel, when the boy was but nine years old. His education was
begun at the Collège des Quatre Nations, where he obtained a
smattering of the classics; but, his artistic talent being already
obvious, he was soon placed by his guardian in the studio of
François Boucher. Boucher speedily realized that his own
erotic style did not suit the lad’s genius, and recommended him
to J. M. Vien, the pioneer of the classical reaction in painting.
Under him David studied for some years, and, after several
attempts to win the prix de Rome, at last succeeded in 1775, with
his “Loves of Antiochus and Stratonice.” Vien, who had just
been appointed director of the French Academy at Rome,
carried the youth with him to that city. The classical reaction
was now in full tide; Winckelmann was writing, Raphael Mengs
painting; and the treasures of the Vatican galleries helped to
confirm David in a taste already moulded by so many kindred
influences. This severely classical spirit inspired his first
important painting, “Date obolum Belisario,” exhibited at Paris
in 1780. The picture exactly suited the temper of the times, and
was an immense success. It was followed by others, painted on
the same principles, but with greater perfection of art: “The
Grief of Andromache” (1783), “The Oath of the Horatii”
(Salon, 1785), “The Death of Socrates,” “Love of Paris and
Helen” (1788), “Brutus” (1789). In the French drama an
unimaginative imitation of ancient models had long prevailed;
even in art Poussin and Le Sueur were successful by expressing
a bias in the same direction; and in the first years of the revolutionary
movement the fashion of imitating the ancients even in
dress and manners went to the most extravagant length. At this
very time David returned to Paris; he was now painter to the
king, Louis XVI., who had been the purchaser of his principal
works, and his popularity was soon immense. At the outbreak
of the Revolution in 1789, David was carried away by the flood
of enthusiasm that made all the intellect of France believe in a
new era of equality and emancipation from all the ills of life.
The success of his sketch for the picture of the “Oath of the Tennis Court,” and his pronounced republicanism, secured David’s election to the Convention in September 1792, by the Section du Muséum, and he quickly distinguished himself by the defence of two French artists in Rome who had fallen into the merciless hands of the Inquisition. As, in this matter, the behaviour of the authorities of the French Academy in Rome had been dictated by the tradition of subservience to authority, he used his influence to get it suppressed. In the January following his election into the Convention his vote was given for the king’s death. Thus the man who was so greatly indebted to the Roman academy and to Louis XVI. assisted in the destruction of both, no doubt in obedience to a principle, like the act of Brutus in condemning his sons—a subject he painted with all his powers. Cato and stoicism were the order of the day. Hitherto the actor had walked the stage in modern dress. Brutus had been applauded in red-heeled shoes and culottes jarretées; but Talma, advised by David, appeared in toga and sandals before an enthusiastic audience. At this period of his life Mademoiselle de Noailles persuaded him to paint a sacred subject, with Christ as the hero. When the picture was done, the Saviour was found to be another Cato. “I told you so,” he replied to the expostulations of the lady, “there is no inspiration in Christianity now!” David’s revolutionary ideas, which led to his election to the presidency of the Convention and to the committee of general security, inspired his pictures “Last Moments of Lepelletier de Saint-Fargeau” and “Marat Assassinated.” He also arranged the programme of the principal republican festivals. When Napoleon rose to power David became his enthusiastic admirer. His picture of Napoleon on horseback pointing the way to Italy is now in Berlin. During this period he also painted the “Rape of the Sabines” and “Leonidas at Thermopylae.” Appointed painter to the emperor, David produced the two notable pictures “The Coronation” (of Josephine) and the “Distribution of the Eagles.”
On the return of the Bourbons the painter was exiled with the other remaining regicides, and retired to Brussels, where he again
