GÉRICAULT, Théodore
(b. 1791, Rouen, d. 1824, Paris)

Wounded Soldiers Retrating from Russia

c. 1814
Pencil, pen and brown ink, watercolour, 250 x 206 mm
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rouen

In spite of his Classical schooling, Géricault broke with traditional themes and forms to set the tone for the developments in French Romanticism. In this picture he took up the theme of a topical historical event. Exhausted almost to the point of death by hunger and cold, these wounded men struggle through a desert of ice. Far from glorifying the soldier's life, Géricault depicted the misery of their extreme situation - an approach in tune with the spirit of his age.