The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of his Sons

Jacques Louis David French

Not on view

This recently discovered sheet is a rare example of a fully worked-up study for David's famous painting The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of His Sons (1789; Musée du Louvre, Paris), commissioned by King Louis XVI and exhibited shortly after the fall of the Bastille. It depicts an episode from the story of Lucius Junius Brutus, who lived during the brutal regime of Tarquin, Rome's last king. To avenge Lucretia's dishonor and suicide, Brutus drove out the monarchy and helped establish the first Roman Empire, only to find his own two sons embroiled in a royalist conspiracy. True to his political convictions, he ordered their execution. David first considered depicting the deaths but chose instead the wrenching domestic aftermath, a subject that deeply resonated in the context of contemporary events.

The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of his Sons, Jacques Louis David (French, Paris 1748–1825 Brussels), Black chalk, pen and black and brown ink, brush and gray and brown wash, heightened with white gouache

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The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of his Sons, Jacques Louis David (French, Paris 1748–1825 Brussels), Black chalk, pen and black and brown ink, brush and gray and brown wash, heightened with white gouache
The Lictors Bringing Brutus the Bodies of his Sons, Jacques Louis David (French, Paris 1748–1825 Brussels), Black chalk, pen and black and brown ink, brush and gray and brown wash, heightened with white gouache

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