Eugène Delacroix was born on April 26, 1798 in France. A Romantic artist, he was considered to be the leader of the French Romantic school. His style was of loose, colorful expressive brush strokes, and he loved exotic subject matter. He was inspired by Rubens, and he placed his emphasis on the action of his scenes, rather than the painstaking details. His interests led him to Africa, where he painted what he saw, and he also illustrated some of the works of William Shakespeare and Walter Scott. Baudelaire said of him, “Delacroix was passionately in love with passion, but coldly determined to express passion as clearly as possible.”^1
Delacroix was an inspiration to Renoir, Manet, and Degas.
Below are shown Last Words of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, Collision of Moorish Horsemen,
Jewish Wedding in Morocco, and Liberty Leading the People.
^1Wellington, Hubert, The Journal of Eugène Delacroix, introduction, page xiv. Cornell University Press, 1980. ISBN 0-8014-9196-7