Liberty Leading the People by Eugène Delacroix

Where? First floor, room 700 of the Denon wing in the Louvre
When? 1830

What do you see? This painting represents what a revolution feels like for the people involved. The woman in the center, referred to as Liberty, is holding the French tricolor. She stands on top of a barricade, which you can recognize by the pieces of wood and the cobblestones in the foreground.

Liberty represents the struggle of the common people for freedom, but at the same time, she shows the energy and excitement that was part of a revolution. In her left hand, she holds an infantry musket. This is a rifle with a bayonet fixed to it, in case she needed to spear an enemy from close range. Liberty is depicted in a victorious pose, and she is showing her breasts to the people.

Liberty is surrounded by a mix of people from the French society. On her right is a child brandishing a pair of guns. At her feet is a day laborer from the countryside wearing a blue jacket (notice the red, white, and blue pattern in his clothes, resembling the French flag). The man to Liberty’s left, with the black jacket and the top hat, is represents the middle-class people (some say it is Delacroix himself, but there is serious doubt about this claim). The man in white on the left is a factory worker holding a saber.

​There is a sharp contrast between the victorious people fighting for the freedom of France and the dead people in the foreground. In the bottom right, you can see a dead soldier and a guardsman. In the background, you can see the smoke of the cannons. In the top right background, the city of Paris is visible with the two iconic towers of the Notre Dame. Finally, the two spars of wood on the right show the signature of the painter, reading “Eug. Delacroix 1830.”

​Backstory: This painting commemorates the July Revolution of 1830 in France. During this revolution, King Charles X of France was brought down. Delacroix wrote in a letter to his brother that if he could not fight for his country, he could at least paint for France.

This painting served as a political poster for the revolution, and the idea was that people would sympathize with the freedom fighters in this painting. It took Delacroix about two months to complete the painting. The next he year he sold the painting to the government for three thousand French francs. In addition, they awarded him the Legion of Honour, the highest French order for merits by military and civilians which was introduced by Napoleon Bonaparte.

July Revolution: After Napoleon Bonaparte was defeated in 1815, the monarchy was restored in France. On July 25, 1830, King Charles X signed four public announcements that were unfavorable to the common people. These announcements included the end of press freedom and a new voting system that favored the higher classes in society.

​On July 27, 1830, the citizens of Paris started the July revolution (also called the Second French Revolution) against King Charles X. The civil war lasted three days, and on August 2, 1830, Charles X officially abdicated. His successor was Louis-Philippe, the cousin of Charles X, who became the new king (until he was brought down in the Third French Revolution of1848).

Symbolism: The woman holding the tricolor represents the goddess of Liberty. The tricolor was the flag of liberty and is now the French national flag (do you also see the tricolor on top of the Notre Dame?).

For this painting, Delacroix was inspired by the Venus of Milo (which is also in the Louvre), and by showing Liberty’s breasts, he signals to us that she is partly a goddess. However, at the same time, Liberty represents a person fighting in the revolution.

The different caps in this painting are representative of the different social classes that participated in the revolution. Do you see the simple hat of the factory worker on the left, the infantry hat of the young man below him who is holding on to the cobblestones, the top hat of the middle class, the cloth of the day laborer at Liberty’s feet, and the student hat of the boy on the right?

The red cap that Liberty wears on her head is also a symbol of liberty. It is a Phrygian cap, which is a soft cap in the form of a cone with the top pulled forward. The Phrygian cap is also called the liberty cap as, especially in artistic works, it represents freedom. This cap was popular during the first French Revolution between 1789 and 1799.

Romanticism? Eugène Delacroix is considered to be the father of French Romantic painting. At the beginning of the 19th century, there was an ongoing debate between Delacroix and Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres on the best style of painting. Ingres, who is considered to be a Neoclassical painter, believed in the classical ideas such as simplicity, symmetry, and idealized beauty in art. However, Delacroix thought that the expressive potential of colors was much more important. He liked to depict moments of extreme emotions as you can see in this painting.
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Who is Eugène Delacroix? Eugène Delacroix (1798-1863) was born in a small village close to Paris. He has made many large-scale paintings about contemporary subjects, which was a successful strategy to earn money around that time. His work was usually dramatic and romantic, and he knew how to express emotions in a painting. He was inspired by artists such as Titian and Rubens and is considered to be the father of French Romanticism. He was a very productive artist, and after his death, 9,140 works were attributed to him, mostly drawings but also 853 paintings. Many other French artists have been inspired by the works of Delacroix, including Degas, Manet, and Renoir. Another famous work by Delacroix, also in the Louvre, is The Death of Sardanapalus.

The Death of Sardanapalus by Delacroix

Fun fact: The design of the Statue of Liberty in New York has been inspired by Delacroix's figure of Liberty in this painting. The Statue of Liberty was designed by the French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi and has been given by France to the United States, where it was unveiled in 1886.

Several changes have been made to the statue compared to Delacroix’s depiction of Liberty: no nudity, no impression of violence, and a crown instead of a Phrygian cap. Liberty, as depicted in Delacroix's painting, has also appeared on the French one hundred Franc banknote from 1979 till 1994 and since 1982 Liberty has also been featured on French postage stamps.
​Interested in a copy for yourself? Poster or canvas (Amazon links).

French postage stamp inspired by Liberty Leading the People

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Written by Eelco Kappe

References:

• cw.routledge.com/ref/romanticera/liberty.pdf