Anne-Louis Girodet (also given as Anne-Louis Girodet de Roucy-Trioson, Anne-Louis Girodet-Trioson) (5 January 1767 – 9 December 1824)[1] was a French painter and pupil of Jacques-Louis David, who was part of the beginning of the Romantic movement by adding elements of eroticism through his paintings. Girodet is remembered for his precise and clear style and for his paintings of members of the Napoleonic family.



Girodet was born at Montargis. He lost his parents in early youth and the care of his inheritance and education fell to his guardian, M. Trioson, "medecin-de-mesdames," by whom he was in later life adopted and whose surname he took in 1812.[1] He started in school by studying architecture and pursuing a military career.[2] He later changed to the study of painting under a painter named Luquin, before entering the school of David. At the age of twenty-two he successfully competed for the Prix de Rome making a name for himself for his painting of the Story of Joseph and his Brethren.[2][3] From 1789 to 1793 he lived in Italy and while in Rome he painted his Hippocrate refusant les presents d'Artaxerxes and Endymion-dormant (presently held in the Louvre), work which was praised at the Salon of 1793.

Back in France, Girodet painted many portraits, including some of the members of the Napoléon family. In 1806, he exhibited "Scène de déluge" (Louvre), to which (in competition with the "Sabines" of David) was awarded the decennial prize.[1] This success was followed up in 1808 by the production of the "Reddition de Vienne" and "Atala au Tombeau" a work which went far to deserve its immense popularity, by a happy choice of subject, and remarkable freedom from the theatricality of Girodet's usual manner, which, however, soon returned again in his "La Révolte du Caire" (1810).

                                                                   Anne Louis Girodet de Roucy-Trioson - Portrait de Napoleon I (Versailles)…