Jacques Gamelin

Active in the south of France between Carcassone and Montpellier, Jacques Gamelin is best known for his battle scenes. Whether imagined or inspired by real events, his drawings of battles are most often executed in white gouache and grey or brown wash on blue prepared paper. The remarkable energy, the sense of movement and the strong desire for expressiveness that characterize these drawings also describe the whole of the artist's work. Gamelin first trained with Jean-Pierre Rivaltz then Deshays in Paris. The artist lived in Italy for almost ten years, from 1765 to 1774, thanks to the patronage of Baron de Puymaurin. The period of time in which Gamelin was in Rome overlapped with that of Goya anf Fussli, and the three artists were acquainted. Gamelin’s art at this time displays his interest in depicting powerful bodies under muscular tension, and the sublime and frightening. In 1766 Gamelin won the first prize for a drawing of the model from life at the Academy of Saint-Luc. In 1772 he decorated the vault of the Palazzo Rondanini with a masterful composition of The Fall of Phaethon. Back in Toulouse, Gamelin became a member of the Academy. He accepted in 1780 the direction of the Academy of Fine Arts in Montpellier. Gamelin received many commissions to decorate churches, as well as portraits and paintings on ancient history. During the revolution, he helped to create the museum of Carcassonne, in order to save the treasures of the churches from the revolutionary destruction.