Loveless Disarming Himself
after 1824
Medium
Lithograph in black on white wove paper
Dimensions
25.7 × 39.4 cm (10 1/8 × 15 9/16 in.)
Classification
lithograph
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
40085
Art Historical Context
Jacques-Louis David, the preeminent French Neoclassical painter and a key figure in the art of the French Revolution, created *Loveless Disarming Himself* as a lithograph late in his exile in Brussels after 1824. Renowned for grand history paintings like *The Death of Marat* and portraits of Napoleon, David turned to lithography in his final, producing a small body of prints that captured his enduring mastery of form and narrative drama. This work, likely an allegorical or literary scene depicting a figure shedding arms in a moment of vulnerability, reflects his neoclassical emphasis on clarit...
About the Artist
Jacques Louis David · 1748–1825
Jacques-Louis David (1748–1825), born in Paris on August 30 to a prosperous family, faced early tragedy when his father was killed in a duel around age nine. Raised by his mother's two architect uncles after his mother departed, David overcame family resistance to architecture and a facial tumor that hindered his speech and studies at the Collège des Quatre-Nations. He began training under the Roc...