The Death of Marat | |
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French: La Mort de Marat | |
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Artist | Jacques-Louis David |
Year | 1793 |
Medium | Oil on canvas |
Movement | Neoclassicism |
Dimensions | 162 cm × 128 cm (64 in × 50 in) |
Location | Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium |
The Death of Marat (French: La Mort de Marat or Marat Assassiné) is a 1793 painting by Jacques-Louis David depicting the artist's friend and murdered French revolutionary leader, Jean-Paul Marat.[1] One of the most famous images from the era of the French Revolution, it was painted when David was the leading French Neoclassical painter, a Montagnard, and a member of the revolutionary Committee of General Security. Created in the months after Marat's death, the painting shows Marat lying dead in his bath after his assassination by Charlotte Corday on 13 July 1793.[2]
In 2001, art historian T. J. Clark called David's painting the first modernist work for "the way it took the stuff of politics as its material, and did not transmute it".[3]
The painting is in the collection of the Royal Museum of Fine Arts of Belgium. A replica, created by the artist's studio, is on display at the Louvre.[4]