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| Jacques-Louis David Oath of the Horatii (1786) oil on canvas 51.26 X 65.63 in. |
During the nineteenth century, a peculiar pejorative was coined to describe French artists working in the Neo-Classical style. Among detractors, these artists became known as the "artistes pompiers," a term which literally translates as "firemen artists." Though today's audience might not immediately grasp the joke, citizens of nineteenth century Paris would have been able to understand the correlation quite easily, and to see the derision in the comment immediately.
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| A helmet worn by the sapeurs-pompiers, circa 1830, from the site Betrand Malvaux Antiquaire Expert. |
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| The uniform of the Sapeurs-Pompiers |
The term "artistes pompiers" was a joke that existed on several levels. Firstly, it had a visual component. It was a comparison between the Greco-Roman helmets which featured so prominently in Neo-Classical painting, with the ornate helmets of Paris' newly formed fire department. And secondly, it was a play on words, poking fun at the similarity between the words "pompier" (from the 15th c. Middle Dutch word pompe, a "water conduit pipe"¹), "pompe" (French for "a stately or splendid procession"), "Pompéin" (French for "from Pompeii), and "pompeux" ("pompous"). It is likely that the pun-like reference between "pompier" and "pompeux" began with comments aimed at the firemen themselves (the sapeur-pompier), who, as a division of Napoleon's Corps of Engineers, were bedecked in some of the most elaborate military uniforms ever witnessed, and who would have made quite a spectacle in the streets of Paris when they were installed in 1810. It was not until the 1830s that the combination "artistes pompiers" fell into common usage.
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| Charles-Édouard Chaise Theseus Victor of the Minotaur (c. 1791) oil on canvas |
Though the insult was first directed at Neo-Classical artists, "artistes pompiers" was a slight that was at its heart always aimed at the French Academies, and in time, came to refer to any artist trained in the "academic tradition." It was considered that the art these academies produced was "without originality, either of conception or execution . . . (containing) well-worn subjects and hackneyed modes of expression, whose style was over-empahtic and pretentious."² Eventually, the Neo-Classicists, the Romantics, the Realists, the Naturalists, the Orientalists, the Barbizon School, the Symbolists, and, to a lesser extent, the Impressionists, all fell under the umbrella of "l'art pompier;" and in art criticism, the term "artistes pompiers" gained in popularity, reaching its apex of usage sometime in the 1940s (though it still sometimes appears today).
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| Sir Nathaniel Dance-Holland The Meeting of Dido and Aeneas oil on canvas 49 X 68.5 in. |
The reasons why the Academies were so derided are numerous and complex, and ofttimes contradictory. There was probably no period in art that was more widely and enthusiastically admired that that of the nineteenth century academies³, and certainly, it was a period when many collectors were willing to pay vast sums to obtain the works of contemporary artists. However, there were issues of class (art had been the province of the royalty, but by the 19th century, was in the hands of the nouveau rich), politics (the Academies, and the annual competitions where artists could secure a lifelong fortune, were state-run and reactionary), and a genuine concern of markets being inundated with similar-looking works of art (the Academies with their specific proscriptions of technique and their over-fondness for making copies, only tightened their focus during the popular historicism movement generated by archeological discoveries in Greece, Italy, and Egypt), that brought a certain level of dissatisfaction with the Academic system.
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| Angélique Mongez Mars and Venus oil on canvas |
Why the pejorative "artistes pompiers" has survived so long is a puzzle that is inextricable from the mystery as to why so-called "Academic" art still garners so much animosity to the present day. What makes this hatred so odd is that "academic" is a plastic term, which, when applied to art, changed according to those in power at the highest levels of education; this is why so many members of the avant-garde eventually became associated with "l'art pompier"– as proponents of new art forms came to power, they just became part of the machine against which they originally rebelled. Why did such feeling not extend to the Moderns when they assumed leadership? And why is it that other nineteenth century artists working in disciplines other than the visual arts, who were attacked for similar weaknesses, have never been dismissed outright as have been the painters and sculptors?⁴
Hopefully the renewed interest in nineteenth century art that began to take hold in the late twentieth century will, if not fully restore the artists of that period to their former glory, at least re-establish their importance to the art which followed them.
¹ "Pump," Online Etymology Dictionary, retrieved February 10, 2014 from {www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=pump&allowed_in_frame=0}.
² "pompier", Dictionnaire Larousse:
Pompier: Adjective applied to artists working in the Neo-Classical style without originality, either of conception or execution. The term is an allusion to helmets, closely resembling those worn by the firemen of the period, which feature as part of the costume in so many of the pictures. By extension the term came to be applied to all artists working in the academic tradition, using well-worn subjects and hackneyed modes of expression, whose style was over-emphatic and pretentious.
³ Harding, James, Artistes Pompiers, (Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., New York, 1979), p. 7.
⁴ In his essay, "Fear and Loathing of the Academic, or Just What is it that Makes the Avant-Garde so Different, so Appealing?" (Art and the Academy in the Nineteenth Century, Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ, 2000), Paul Barlow makes a convincing argument that the academic painter Frederic Lord Leighton has been treated much more harshly than his contemporary, the poet Alfred Lord Tennyson. Though both men were similarly admired and honored in the lifetimes, and both were disparaged by the Modernists who followed them, only Leighton was nearly expunged from the Encyclopaedia Britannica. In 1970, the entry on Leighton was very short and dismissive, and included only one painting, whereas Tennyson was afforded an extensive entry, which included both the positives and negatives in his work. As time has gone on, and we have become more removed from the rebellion against Victorian culture, the reviews of Tennyson in the Encyclopaedia Britannica have only become more positive, while Leighton's entry has remained remarkably unchanged through the 1986 and 1997 editions.