Born Aug. 29, 1780, in Montauban; died Jan. 14, 1867, in Paris. French painter, graphic artist, and musician.
Ingres was a pupil of J. L. David. He also studied the violin. In his youth, Ingres served in the episcopal chapel in Montauban and performed as a soloist in the orchestra of the municipal theater in Toulouse. From 1806 to 1824 he lived and worked in Italy, studying the art of the Renaissance, especially the paintings of Raphael in Rome. He was director of the French Academy in Rome from 1834 to 1841.
Ingres painted scenes on literary, historical, and religious subjects, for example, Jupiter and Thetis (1811, Musée Granet, Aix-en-Provence), The Vow of Louis XIII (1824, Montauban Cathedral), Oedipus and the Sphinx (1827, Louvre), The Apotheosis of Homer (1827, Louvre), and The Turkish Bath (1862–63, Louvre). His detailed, penetrating portraits include Madame Devau-cay (1807, Musée Conde, Chantilly), three portraits of members of the Riviere family (1805, Louvre), L. Benin (1832, Louvre), and Madame Moitessier (1851, National Gallery, Washington, D.C.). Valpincon Bather (1818, Louvre) and La Grande Odalisque (1814, Louvre) are among his well-known nudes. He also executed portraits of N. Paganini, C. Gounod, F. Liszt, and other music figures.
Many of Ingres’s works, especially his early paintings, reveal a subtle palette of harmoniously clear, light shades. However, his style is noted mainly for its precise, supple, and expressive linear composition. Ingres produced numerous brilliant pencil portraits, most of which are housed at the Ingres Museum in Montauban. The classical tendencies in his works had a considerable influence on the development of academicism in French art. Ingres also studied problems of music education and voice training.